This is the Hunt
by FicsOnFridays6
Summary: In the small town called Idris, everybody knows what the Circle is. The Circle is a gang of dangerous and lethal people that hunt their victims down in the middle of the night. More dangerous than any sort of Assassin, The Circle is run by a man called Valentine and his heir, Sebastian. *Clabastian/Incest*
1. Nothing is the Same

**Summary: In the small town called Idris, everybody knows what the Circle is. The Circle is a gang of dangerous and lethal people that hunt their victims down in the middle of the night. More dangerous than any sort of Assassin, The Circle is run by a man called Valentine and his heir, Sebastian. Now, Jocelyn Fairchild, who knows goes by Jocelyn Fray, is back in her hometown Idris, creating a new group called the Shadowhunters who fight the Circle.**

**In the beginning of the summer, Clary Fray moves to Idris, unknowing about the Circle and its members. Little does she know that her mother has been hiding their true identity, and Jace, the boy who she thought was her brother was not who she thought he was. She was somehow connected to this town, and when she meets Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern, she learns that she had a whole different side to herself than she never knew she had. When she starts falling for Sebastian, the chaos happening in her life seems to spiral out of control, and she learns that her connection with Idris was not just a coincidence. **

**I hope you guys enjoy this crap! Yeeeeet! Also, they're human. remember that, lol**

**~S**

**Warnings: Incest(obviously)**

***Disclaimer: I don't own TMI***

* * *

Idris looked different than she'd expected. When the car finally moved to a halt after hours of what seemed like endless driving, Clary opened the door and stepped outside, her boots making a thudding sound as she swung herself out, as she was too short for her feet to naturally touch the concrete.

She instinctively pulled out the pencil she'd held her hair up with during the car ride and let her hair tumble down, waves upon waves of red curls cascading down her shoulders and slightly covering half of her face. After brushing that hair out of her face, she pulled out a notebook from her pocket in the same instinctive way she had pulled out the pencil from her hair.

"Boo." She year a voice behind her, then jumped and helped out, feeling a familiar hand on her shoulder.

"Jace!" Clary shouted, whipping her head around to glare at her brother, her hair slapping his face. He was bent over, laughing.

It was at times like these when Clary's mind seemed to switch from a normal one to a perfectionist one instead.

Jace was the perfect brother. With his athleticism, blonde hair and golden eyes, pearly white teeth and height, he looked nothing like her. _The opposite siblings, _people back in Alicante would call them. Clary took after their mom, and Jace took after their father, who had been dead for sixteen years… at least, he was to Clary's knowledge. Clary was in no way athletic, she was a red-head with freckles and green eyes, and was very, very short. Just under five feet, in fact, while Jace bordered six feet.

Although they were different in almost every way possible, Clary loved her brother.

"I had to!" He replied, his face red from laughter, towering over her. "And after I got to see the look on your face it was _so _worth it!" Clary reached down to the concrete, picking up the pencil and the notebook that had fallen when Jace had scared her. "Can you draw me?" Jace asked in a way so that she couldn't tell if he was being serious or not.

"No." Clary replied, "There are tons of girls willing to draw your self portrait. Actually, they would throw themselves at you, you could dodge them, they could hit a wall, and there you have it. A mural."

"But you're the best artist I know." Jace said, some truthfulness in his voice, which was a bit sudden.

She shook her head for a moment, about to say something, but then was interrupted by their mother calling them. "Jace! Clary!" Jocelyn emerged from behind the car, holding the two boxes packed to the brim with all of their belongings. They wouldn't have been able to afford the move unless they'd sold most of their things.

Clary was still angry about the move, but she knew that it was because her mother had gotten a job offer that she couldn't refuse. And by couldn't refuse, it was because they were on the verge of becoming homeless. So they'd packed their bags and left as soon as the school year ended, which was less than a week ago, leaving everything that they'd known, although Jocelyn seemed to already be quite acquainted with the area, despite this being the first time she'd come to Idris, at least to Clary's knowledge.

Jace took one of the boxes, letting Jocelyn relax. "Clary, take the other one." This was the Jace that Clary admired the most. The kind, caring and compassionate Jace that would do anything for his mother, not the rude and perverted asshole that she'd come to know in Alicante. Perhaps Idris would change him for the better.

Clary sighed, tucking the pencil back into her hair once she realized she wouldn't have the time to doodle, and stuffed the small notebook into her jean pocket. She took the second box and watched as Jocelyn led them to the entrance to their new house.

Jocelyn inserted the key into the doorknob and twisted it, revealing the insides of the house.

"What the fuck…?" Jace said, his nose wrinkled in disgust at the house… or should she call it a nasty old shack in the middle of nowhere?

What she immediately noticed was the peeling paint and the rust covering the side of the tiny house. There was dead grass surrounding the house, and a foul stench coming from the inside of the house. It smelled like something dead.

She pinched her nose, and so did Jace and Jocelyn. She let go for a moment. "Mom, you said that the house was going to be better than the one back at home."

Jocelyn sighed. "We can't do anything about it now.." Jocelyn pulled the house keys out of her purse and stuck it into the lock. "This is our home now. It's not Alicante, but… it's… home." It didn't open for a moment.

Then the door fell forwards, right on top of Jace. "Jesus Christ!" Jace said, coughing from the gross smell that came from the house. "What the fuck is that smell?"

"You?" She snorted, making sure not to drop the box that was still in her hand. Jace rolled his eyes at her, placing his box down on the floor, and then Clary did the same.

Clary's jaw dropped as soon as she lifted her eyes off of the floor.

The whole house literally had only two rooms: the bathroom and everything else. There was one filthy, torn mattress on the carpet, which was also filthy and torn. The fridge's door was nowhere to be seen, and the table in the center of the room was missing a leg. After looking around for a moment, she flopped on the only thing that seemed to be intact: the couch. Although it did smell, it was the only piece of furniture that looked stable enough to hold her weight.

Jocelyn slowly walked towards the mattress, her head looking towards the floor, and then she sat down. Her head was in her hands. "I'm sorry. I really, really am."

Not wanting to make Jocelyn feel worse than she already did, Clary sat down quietly next to her mother, putting an arm on her shoulder, trying to comfort her. "Mom…Mom, hey, it's okay."

"But Clare, it's not. You might make her feel worse by telling her that it's going to be 'okay.'" Jace said, his usual sarcasm and dry humor gone.

"What else am I supposed to say?" Clary threw her arms up into the air. "One minute, we're driving in the city, all happy… the next, we're in a disgusting house that smells like dead skunk!"

"You're supposed to suck it up and act like everything's normal!"

"You're such a dick!" Clary cried, slamming her hands down on the floor, some of the floorboard cracking, as it was so fragile they broke with almost no effort at all.

"Enough!" Jocelyn shouted, "This is hard enough! I don't need you to start arguing about this house, okay? I'm already stressed out as it is, alright?!" Her expression softened once she saw them slowly start to calm down. "Now find a space on the floor and claim it as your own before you start complaining about having no space."

While Jace automatically plopped down on the couch, which was across of the mattress that Clary had just gotten off of, Clary went to the boxes that they'd brought with them.

She reached inside the first box and withdrew another box labeled _Clary's Things, _which was about half the size of the box it came from. After going to a corner of the room that didn't seem to smell as bad as the couch, she picked at the tape sealing the box shut, her nail polish chipping slightly as she peeled it.

After sitting down in a corner of the room, she finally opened it, and suddenly tons of emotions seemed to rush at her. She reached into the box and pulled out a photo frame, and blinked back tears. _Si… _her best friend was back in Alicante.

In the picture, they were both grinning, there arms around each other, snow in their hair, and their faces red from the cold. They were in front of her old house. Her old house hadn't been big or the best, but it was home to Clary. Clary looked up for a moment, and the thought of her old home made her blood boil. Why had her mother brought them to Idris of all places? Idris, a so-called crime ridden city full of thugs and gangs. To compare her old home in Alicante to Idris was like comparing art by a toddler and Van Gough.

Closing her eyes, she placed the frame down onto the floor and reached for something else in the box. She pulled out old art competition stuff, clothes, and finally a locket.

But what significance did this locket have? Clary didn't know for sure. All she knew was that her mother didn't like it, and that somehow, it connected her to her father. Fingering the locket, she looked at it just as she had many times before. It was quite rusted, but the symbol carved on it was still visible. On one side was a diamond symbol, two arched lines coming from the top. **(The angelic power rune)** The other side had a circle on it. Clary had no idea what it meant, but somehow, she was drawn to it. It was the only thing that connected her to her father.

After putting the locket on and then hiding it under her green sweater, she got up and vowed that she would fix the house as much as she could, as she believed that there was no point in moping around any longer.

She walked over to Jace, who was laying around on the broken couch and kicked him hard in the gut. "Get up."

"Why?" Jace groaned. "I'm perfectly fine where I am."

"You said that this house smells." Clary said, throwing a towel onto his face. "Now help me make it not smell, would you?"

Jace threw the towel back at her, but got up. "Fine."

"While you two do that, I'm going to go somewhere real quick, okay?" Jocelyn said, waving her car keys in front of them. Her outfit was different than the one from earlier. It was cleaner, more refined. Clary didn't question it.

"Wait! No fair!" Jace cried out. "I didn't even want to clean!"

What he got in response was the slam of the front door.

After a couple hours of wiping the floors, Jace collapsed on the couch in defeat. "I'm done. I can't anymore."

Clary was nowhere near done, as her perfectionism had gotten to her as she was cleaning. She'd even retrieved a sewing kit from one of the boxes and started to patch up the carpet.

"We've cleaned for _three _hours, and it still smells like somebody died!" Jace exclaimed, his head in the cushion.

Exasperated, Clary threw a dust-covered towel at him. "Does it look like we can afford any fabreze? No, it doesn't. Get your lazy ass off of the couch!"

"I don't want to!" Jace complained.

Clary hit him with a towel once, but then sighed in defeat, shoulders sagging as she sat down. "When did mom say she was coming back?"

"Didn't say." Jace responded.

It was ten pm when Jocelyn finally decided to show up back at their home. "Sorry it took so long." She tried to encourage Jace and Clary to smile, but she got two glares from them instead.

Clary looked up from her notebook, revealing a couple sketches of the alleys they'd seen on the way to the house. "What took you so long?"

Jace's eyebrows were raised in suspicion. "Is it the new… job you were talking about?"

"Y-Yeah. Of course. I just needed to check in." Jocelyn stammered, but quickly covered it up with a chuckle.

"And it took you… seven hours?" Jace said, looking slightly confused.

"I had to talk a little bit with my boss." Jocelyn said, her face paling slightly.

"Okay…" Clary responded before Jace could, giving him a _we'll talk later _look. "You should get some rest, mom. There's some pizza in the broken fridge."

It only took Clary a couple more second to notice the blood on Jocelyn's sleeve.

Later that night, there was a banging noise coming from across the room. It had been eerily quiet before then, so Clary hadn't noticed at first. The whole house was dark, and not a single light was on, so Clary tried to close her eyes and go back to sleep.

Not even less than five minutes later, the banging sound came back, but with more aggression. Clary heard panting and banging, and was disturbed by the dragging sound that seemed quite close to her.

She tossed and turned, but did it quietly, not wanting to wake up her brother or mom. _It's nothing. Stop being so paranoid. _She argued with herself before she heard a gunshot come from outside.

She took that as a warning sign and finally got up, tripping on some of her blankets, a thudding sound filling the room as she fell. Her face paling at the thought that whoever fired the gun could be lingering outside of the door. She also panicked at the fact that if nothing had happened, she'd ruined somebody's sleep.

Clary reached for her phone and turned the flashlight on before going to the kitchen area and taking a kitchen knife from the counter and holding it tightly in her grip. She shook her head, questioning her sanity. Wasn't it natural for her to be a little afraid to be in a new place after living somewhere else for all of her life?

She looked at her reflection in the knife and reeled back once she saw her face. It looked surprisingly vicious. Her pale skin and red hair made her look almost like a vampire or something of that sort.

While tugging at the strings of her hoodie and tightening it, she put on some sneakers and ignored her trembling fingers as she turned the doorknob. She paled when she noticed it was unlocked. It had been locked before she went to sleep, that she knew for sure.

"Is anybody out here?" Clary called our, but then covered her mouth with her hands. She didn't know who she could trust here. She listened for a sound of an intruder, but she could hear nothing.

There was a dripping noise close by, but that was the least of her concerns. There was a rustle behind her, and she turned quickly, shifting the light of her flashlight in that direction.

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

In the brief moment that the flashlight shined on the intruder, she saw all that she needed to. He was covered in all black, and held the smallest gun she'd ever seen in his hands. Before he escaped, she saw a symbol branded on the side of his neck.

Somebody chased after him, but she didn't bother to look at them.

The symbol she'd seen was the same circle that was on her locket.

A shiver ran through her body before she turned both ways in fear that somebody else was there before listening to the dripping noise. A horrific feeling came over her as she tip-toed towards the broken shack next to the house.

There was a loud creaking noise as Clary forced the rusted metal door open. There was a bag on the highest shelf, and the dripping noise came from that. Clary was scared to shine her flashlight on it at this point.

She contemplated telling her brother or mom, but came to the conclusion that they were under so much stress already that they didn't need any more of it.

So she gathered up her courage and shined the flashlight on the bag.

She dropped everything she was holding, the flashlight falling to the ground beside her in an angle that was almost too perfect.

All the blood left in her face drained and she stifled a scream.

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

Blood. Blood was everywhere. Blood on the bag, blood on the floor, blood dripping onto her white sneakers. Stepping backwards once… twice… _snap. _She jumped up and covered her mouth again, sweat dripping down her forehead when she realized what she'd stepped on was… a foot.

She didn't know who was watching, what she was doing… or if she should just run back home and pretend to sleep until she could tell her mom everything.

But then again…

Clary remembered the blood on her mom's sleeve, and a jolt of fear ran up her spine. If the symbol not the man's neck was the same as the one on her locket, and the locket had once belonged to her father…

then she had no way to know if her mother was in league with whoever that person was.

All she knew was that somebody died that night.

She slowly peeled open the bag.

This time, it was almost impossible to hold in a scream.

It was Simon.

Somehow, in some impossible way… the body was Simon's.

This time, she opened her phone and opened up the voicemails she'd gotten earlier that day from Simon and left to answer later. The voicemails she should've answered.

"_Hey, Fray. Surprise! I thought I'd come visit you once at your new place. Your mom said I could come, since your birthday's in a week."_

"_Clary, I know this is really weird…even by my standards, but I-I really need to see you."_

"_Clary. I know this is sudden, but I owe somebody a lot of money, and I mean a lot. I just… I need to see you before they come after me."_

"_The Circle, Clary. The Circle is coming after me."_

The last ones were marked thirty minutes ago.

"_Clary, I just need to let you know that I love you, and I'm sorry."_

"_Clary, they're coming after me. P-please. Please h-" _There was a gunshot and then silence.

Clary dropped the phone, overwhelming emotions filling her up. Fear, of course.. but then a scary amount of fury and grief filled her up instead. Her fists were balled and her fists shook, and she fell to her knees.

Letting out a sudden, choked gasp, she covered her mouth to silence herself as tears fell from her face, before she noticed the words written down in a place she hadn't noticed before.

They were written in blood. _Simon's _blood.

_Drip._

_Drip._

_Drip._

A shiver ran up her spine, tears and blood mixing together into one as she read the words.

_We're coming after you._

_Nowhere to run._

_This is the hunt._

* * *

**What do you think? It's unedited, but this is my first AU fanfic and I'm kind of nervous because this isn't really my genre, but I'm going to give it a shot. I have all kind of things planned out for this so be on the lookout and follow/favorite. I would love a review as well.**

**Since I'm working on other fanfics as well, this might not really Ah e an update schedule.**

**~Sara**


	2. There's a New World Calling my Name

**This fanfic got.. so much more recognition than I thought there would be. Thank you sooo much! I got caught up watching kpop videos and studying, so… sorry for the late update. Enjoy!**

**Incase you don't remember: ****In the small town called Idris, everybody knows what the Circle is. The Circle is a gang of dangerous and lethal people that hunt their victims down in the middle of the night. More dangerous than any sort of Assassin, The Circle is run by a man called Valentine and his heir, Sebastian. Now, Jocelyn Fairchild, who knows goes by Jocelyn Fray, is back in her hometown Idris, creating a new group called the Shadowhunters who fight the Circle.**

**In the beginning of the summer, Clary Fray moves to Idris, unknowing about the Circle and its members. Little does she know that her mother has been hiding their true identity, and Jace, the boy who she thought was her brother was not who she thought he was. She was somehow connected to this town, and when she meets Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern, she learns that she had a whole different side to herself than she never knew she had. When she starts falling for Sebastian, the chaos happening in her life seems to spiral out of control, and she learns that her connection with Idris was not just a coincidence. **

**I hope you guys enjoy this chapter! **

**~Sara**

**Warnings: Blood(?), Incest(obviously)**

**Rating: T (for now?)**

***Disclaimer: I don't own TMI***

**~Sara**

* * *

Clary stood there, shaking, her hands wet with the blood of her best friend. She took her phone from the ground, and tried to wipe off the blood from the screen, only to spread it, as her tears were dripping everywhere. The phone's flashlight was starting to dim. Clary didn't know what she was supposed to do. Suppose her mother was involved with this… then what would she do? Could she trust her brother, too?

She shouldn't be doing this by herself. She'd tried and found her best friend's dead body in a bag. She clutched the kitchen knife she'd brought out with her to her chest, scared of what would happen if whoever that person was came back. Simon said that he owed a debt. If they still needed it, they could come for her… whoever they were.

The symbol on the man's neck was the same as the one on her locket. She'd assumed it was something like a hieroglyph, but now that she'd seen the same symbol branded into a man's skin, she didn't know what to think. She was too scared to take the locket off, but too scared to look at it.

She wanted to tell her mother, but a sliver of doubt filled her, so she decided to keep it a secret… for as long as she could. She thought she was stupid for doubting her mother, but then again… did she really know who to trust? How was Simon involved with this? Why did he owe… _The Circle _money? She was too afraid to utter the words _Circle. _

She closed the door to the shack and closed her eyes.

That was a mistake.

She saw Simon's body all over again. She slid to the ground, dropping the knife and the phone and everything. She wished she could unsee everything. She wished she didn't have to know how Simon died. A bunch of lies to cover what she'd seen up would've been better than finding his body in the shack on a place she'd just moved to.

But the biggest question of all- the one that held onto her the most, was-

What else did she not know about Idris?

She couldn't understand this.. She couldn't understand any of it. But she focused on what she knew at the moment. Clary didn't know how the symbol on her locket was connected to the symbol on the man's neck, but she knew that it was the same. What she knew was that her mom was the owner of her locket, but it had originally come from her father, who was dead. Therefore, if the symbol was connected to the man who'd murdered Simon, then that meant that her father- and her mother were both connected to the… _circle. _

That meant that Jace could also be involved in it somehow. Clary continued to panic. What if her mother had invited Simon over just so he could be killed? No… not her mom. At least, that's what she thought.

But then again, who could she even trust?

She picked up the bloody knife and threw it into the bushes, not caring if Jocelyn noticed the missing kitchen knife once it became morning. That's when Clary decided to keep it all a secret. She didn't want them to come after her, too.

_What about Simon's mom and sister?_ More thoughts swam through her mind.

But Clary couldn't save Simon if he was already dead, could she? Clary peeled her phone case off of her phone because the blood on the case had already dried, and threw it into the bushes with the knife.

After that, she ran back into the house, fearing for her life.

The rest of the night was eerily quiet.

* * *

Clary had just begun to enjoy (if that's what you could call it) a cup of coffee. She was still scared out of her mind, but she had to keep calm around everybody else. If anybody she knew was somehow in league with… _The Circle, _then if they saw her freak out, they'd know why.

And maybe they'd come after her too.

Maybe they'd kill her the same way they killed Simon. The same way they'd killed her best friend.

Clary's blood went cold for a moment when she saw a person she didn't recognize talking to Jace outside.

It was only until now that she'd realized that her trust in everybody and everything had been completely wrecked. A while ago she would've said that she trusted her brother with her life.

Now? Now she wasn't so sure.

They both walked in. The person that she didn't recognize seemed to be a girl around her age. Long locks of hair the color of a raven's feathers went down to her waist and she had the sort of aura that said that she was confident with how she was.

Clary wrinkled her nose in disgust. Was this another one of Jace's hook ups? Because if it was, she wasn't going to be able to live in a house full of sluts _and _dead bodies.

Her mother was the next one to wake up. Her eyes widened for a moment when she saw the girl, but her face changed back to a normal, blank expression as quickly at it came up. Clary could've imagined it, but there was a feeling in her gut that told her that Jocelyn knew this girl somehow.

The girl, however, didn't show much emotion. "Hi, Ms. Fray."

Clary was quick to watch for her mother's expressions. Her mother seemed to think of something, because she smiled at the girl. "Hello, Isabelle. It's nice to see you, but can I please ask why you're here… in my house?"

"I contacted Jace since last night there was another atta-"

Jocelyn dropped her cup of coffee. "Oh god, I got this on _Valentine's _day."

The girl, Isabelle spoke up again. "I was going to contact you first, but you weren't answering your phone."

The next thing Clary noticed was the tattoo on the girl's hand. It was in the shape of a diamond, but with two arches sticking out from the middle in opposite directions **(A/N: The angelic power rune)**. The same symbol hung around her neck along with a ruby pendant.

"Wait.. Wait. Mom, how do you know this person? And Jace… what the hell? How do you know somebody mom works with?"

"S-she's an intern at the company, and Jace was visiting and showing her around since it was her first day."

Clary couldn't tell if it was a lie or not.

"Well, I'll talk to you later about the mug I broke. You know, about the _Valentine_ gift?" The way that Isabelle said valentine gave Clary chills. "It was very nice to meet you, Clary. Walk me out, Jace? We should talk a little."

Whether it was meant to be flirtatious or serious, Clary knew that she was going to be following them.

She waited until her mother got occupied with something else before tip toeing after the two.

Once she caught glimpses of the conversation, she knew that she had been right that they were lying.

"-But did you really have to come at four a.m and expect to be let in when my _sister, _who may I remind you knows _nothing_ was here."

"I know, but there were ten more killings last night. Valentine is angry and so is Sebastian. We need our best Shadowhunters-"

"Can't we get one day without chasing them around? There are plenty more Shadowhunters."

"We lost _five _last night, Jace. Next time it could be Alec and Magnus. Or Maia. Or Raphael." Isabelle warned, "Imagine if we lost Alec or Magnus right before they get married."

Jace looked down. "You're right. I was careless. Just go before my sister hears anything. I'll see you tonight at the institute." Jace said quickly, motioning towards a car where a boy that looked a little older than Jace but had the same physical features as Isabelle did.

"Alec, I get it, I'm sorry." She said, a melancholy look on her face as she got into the car.

Once the feeling of disbelief from listening in on the conversation wore off, Clary started to panic. Valentine? Killings? Alec and Magnus? Sebastian? What was all of that about? Shadowhunters? Institute?

_Killings…_ had Simon been one of those killed in what seemed to be that string of murders? _Valentine_. Who was Valentine? He didn't sound like a good person. What was the Circle?

She had nobody she could trust to ask any of these questions. And from the conversation she'd heard, Jace knew what going on and had been lying to her. How much longer were they planning to hide it? Forever? Did nobody think that she was worthy of knowing things?

What she knew right then was that there were definitely three people that knew about whatever was going in Idris: Jace, Isabelle, and Jocelyn.

She just had to find somebody else who knew something. Somehow. Somewhere.

She remembered the bloody words that she'd read last night.

_We're coming after you._

_Nowhere to run._

_This is the hunt._

* * *

**Sorry that the chapter is so short! I've been busy with exams and tests since it's the end of the school year now. But once summer starts I'll be pretty busy too. Don't worry, I won't leave without a reason. :) I hope you enjoyed! Leave a review and favorite or follow!**

**~Sara**


	3. I Can't Escape This

**Hey guys, sorry I keep taking breaks. I just went through my exams and tests and all that and since it'll be summer soon, I'll try to update more but I won't make any promises. I'm going on vacation during the summer to Japan as well at the end of July, so I'll be trying to pre-write chapters so I can update like 3-4 times all at once so you guys have a lot to read while I'm gone. :)**

**Anyway thanks for all the support and reviews. I still have no idea where the heck the plot is going but whatever. I'll figure it out like I always do. I'm not sure when Clary is going to meet Sebastian but it'll be soon. Probably. I don't know how many chapters this'll have either, but it'll be a lot. Probably. **

**~s**

**Incase you don't remember: ****In the small town called Idris, everybody knows what the Circle is. The Circle is a gang of dangerous and lethal people that hunt their victims down in the middle of the night. More dangerous than any sort of Assassin, The Circle is run by a man called Valentine and his heir, Sebastian. Now, Jocelyn Fairchild, who knows goes by Jocelyn Fray, is back in her hometown Idris, creating a new group called the Shadowhunters who fight the Circle.**

**In the beginning of the summer, Clary Fray moves to Idris, unknowing about the Circle and its members. Little does she know that her mother has been hiding their true identity, and Jace, the boy who she thought was her brother was not who she thought he was. She was somehow connected to this town, and when she meets Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern, she learns that she had a whole different side to herself than she never knew she had. When she starts falling for Sebastian, the chaos happening in her life seems to spiral out of control, and she learns that her connection with Idris was not just a coincidence.**

**Previously: **_**What she knew right then was that there were definitely three people that knew about whatever was going in Idris: Jace, Isabelle, and Jocelyn. **_

_**She just had to find somebody else who knew something. Somehow. Somewhere. **_

_**She remembered the bloody words that she'd read last night. **_

_**We're coming after you.**_

_**Nowhere to run.**_

_**This is the hunt.**_

**Warning: Incest**

Clary needed to find whatever the _institute _was. She needed to know why people were being killed and she didn't know about it. How her brother and mother talked creepily about a person named Valentine. Clary needed to find where the institute was, but the things was- she couldn't just… ask Jace or Jocelyn. She needed to find somebody who knew about the institute. Somebody that she could trust.

But she couldn't trust anybody anymore, could she? Not when she'd just moved to this hell of a town and not when she'd just found out that her brother _and _mother were involved in some sort of group called _Shadowhunters_ and she's had no idea of its existence.

But she had to get back inside the house before Jace did and before her mother realized that Clary wasn't inside where she was supposed to be. She dug her phone out of her pocket and took a picture of Isabelle and Jace and whoever the man in the car was before she ran inside the house.

Once she got inside, she dug her sketchpad out from underneath a pile of clothes, tied her messy hair into a bun and stuck a charcoal pencil inside of it. "I'm heading out~" Clary said, trying to keep her voice as steady as she could, although she was questioning everything.

"Don't be late." Jocelyn, who was also in the process of getting ready for _work, _whatever that was, waved Clary goodbye.

"I definitely won't be." Clary replied, also sticking a pocket knife inside her shoes. She wasn't going to risk being defenseless in any sort of situation.

Clary walked through the dark alleyways of Idris. The sun was setting at this point, but she didn't care. What she knew was that it was in the night that the true Idris was revealed. The Idris with people- dangerous people that knew about the true nature of Idris.

Clary hadn't cared until last night. Last night when she'd found the dead body of her best friend who to her knowledge had lived in a town across the country. But she'd found him inside a shed in her backyard, his blood dripping onto her feet as the realization that Simon, her _best friend_, was dead sank in. That her best friend had been killed by some sort of gang. A gang that had a symbol that was strangely similar to a symbol on the locket that her father had left for her when he'd died when Clary was a baby.

She slowly watched the sun set and kept her guard up as she once again checked to see if the knife that she'd brought with her to the city was still tucked into her boots. As the sun set, her hair blended into the darkness along with her clothes and she practically melted into the shadows. She didn't even flinch when she heard the police sirens blaring throughout town- something that she hadn't cared to notice last night.

There were gunshots, screaming, and cries for help everywhere that she could listen. Clary stayed put, wanting to see for herself what sort of horror this town had been concealing from her.

Clary realized that even though she was hidden in the shadows, somebody could see her. Her hair was too noticeable, her pale skin too bright for the darkness to fully conceal her. She pulled her sleeves farther down and reached to pull her hood up to cover her hair.

"Lost?"

She flinched slightly before turning around, kicking her foot up so her knife landed into her hand. She prayed that the stranger didn't see it in the dark. "Excuse me?" She said, her hood falling back down.

"I said, are you lost?"

Clary wasn't sure if she could trust whoever it was if she couldn't see them. She turned on her phone flashlight and violently turned it at the stranger's direction, not thinking for a moment whether or not the person could be dangerous.

But the stranger had dodged the light.

"Don't trust me?"

"Come into the light." Clary demanded, trying to hide the waver in her voice. "Then I'll see if I can trust you."

He stepped into the light. His eyes were pitch black, just like the darkness that surrounded them. In contrast, his hair was as pale as the moon that wasn't visible today, almost as light as snow but with bits of color that made his hair look ghostly. The only way to tell that his hair wasn't completely white was his skin, which was clearly as pale as snow.

In short, he looked like both heaven and hell wrapped into one sort of hybrid. He almost looked inhumane.

He looked down at her. "Are you okay? It's dangerous to be out here at a time like this. You don't look like you know what goes on at night." All of a sudden he looked more human to her. The concern he was showing was genuine.

"I know enough." Her tone was sharp, and a little bit harsh.

There were gunshots in the distance. "Shadowhun-I mean, you should get out of here." He said quickly.

Clary started to leave, but she realized what he'd just said. _Shadowhun-Shadowhunters. _By coincidence, she'd run into a man that knew just who the shadowhunters were. It was perfect. Maybe her stupid plan would work after all. She grabbed his hand to keep him from leaving. "I need to know." She said quickly without thinking.

"What?" He seemed shocked at what she'd said.

"I need to know about the Shadowhunters. What they're doing. What they are."

The original concern on his face melted into something else but as quickly as it came, it disappeared. "It's not safe out here." He said. "Follow me."

He took her hand and they melted into the shadows, going far too fast for Clary to be able to see what was going on. At last, she was flung through a door and landed hard against the wall.

She couldn't see anything. It was too dark.

"You shouldn't know what the Shadowhunters are. Are you one of them?" His tone was hostile.

Clary didn't know what to say. The kind stranger that had approached her mere minutes ago seemed to have vanished and had been replaced by someone totally different. "No-" She managed to say. "My brother is one. Jace. Jace Fray."

The boy looked away for a moment but then looked back at her, the hostile interrogator gone once again. "My cousin Aline is one. I'm here in town to visit her from France." He said quietly. "But you don't seem to be one of them… and yet you found out. I guess you've heard about the Circle, then."

Clary nodded. "I've heard about… _Valentine._"

The boy looked at her for a moment, as if trying to look for words to say. "And his son, Sebastian Morgenstern?" The way he said his name gave her an off sort of feeling, but she continued to listen to the beautiful stranger.

Clary shook her head.

The boy's shoulder seemed to relax. "Do you want me to call Aline and take you to the institute? Your brother must be worried if you've been missing."

Clary felt the blood drain from her face. She was supposed to be back before dinner… and right now, it was around midnight. They would think she had run away, or that she was hurt… or that she was dead.

She needed to find them… which meant trusting a stranger who could possibly be one of the enemy.

But she needed to trust him in order to get back. She had no clue where she was and if she did try to find the institute by herself, then she could very well end up dead. She held out her hand to him. "Take me there."

He tightened a knife onto his belt and looked back at her, nodding.

"Oh, by the way.." She said after considering it for a few seconds. "I'm Clarissa. Clarissa Fray."

"I'm Jonathan. Just Jonathan."

His obsidian colored eyes seemed to pierce into hers as he took her hand into his and they slipped back into the darkness.

**Hey guys. Sorry for not updating for a month. I was feeling really unmotivated so this chapter was actually written throughout the course of this month. I'm really sorry haha. I'll update a lot more now that the stress from exams and stuff are over. Expect a Dark Artifices fic soon :) and maybe a couple one shots if I'm feeling inspired. Love you guys**

**~S**


	4. Shadows Break the Dark-MY RETURN

**I have to start off by apologizing to all of you. Last year I was at the top of my game, updating every single week, and now I've gotten so lazy. So unmotivated that I update every month. I need to fix that. It's the summer. I'm free all the time. I have to confess that my mental health hasn't been the best this year and that's nobody's fault but mine. And I've taken my break from writing and now I'm back. For good. With my schedule. My once a week schedule. I'm going to update every friday once I come back from my vacation in Japan, which was delayed. :) So I hope you can accept my apology and continue to read my fanfics, because this is what makes me happy.**

**So to finish this conversation, I'll be on vacation from the 6th to the 22nd. When the school year starts, I'll actually be able to write more because I'm so busy this summer. See ya then. Thank you for all the reviews and favorites! **

**This chapter is dedicated to Horses8 for the continuous support throughout the past year. Wouldn't have written this if it weren't for you. Thank you :)**

**~S**

**Last chapter, because I obviously haven't updated in a month.: **"_**I'm Jonathan. Just Jonathan."**_

_**His obsidian colored eyes seemed to pierce into hers as he took her hand into his and they slipped back into the darkness.**_

They were running as fast as their feet could carry them in the darkness. Clary clung on to Jonathan in fear that the people who were firing the gunshots that she was hearing in the distance were coming for her just like they did with Simon. She shut her eyes but it didn't really do anything. Everything in sight was pitch black.

After a while, she let the darkness consume her and blended in, her arms around Jonathan. She was scared, scared of what was to come. Thoughts of Jace, Isabelle and her mother swarmed through her head. How could they hide such a thing from her? Why would they hide something that would end up getting her best friend killed; would end up leaving her all alone and without questions.

She began to think of two days ago, when she was in the car on her way to Idris, leaving everything she knew behind, believing that she was going to start fresh somewhere new with her perfect family. Her charming but annoying older brother, her loving mother… all of that seemed too good to be true. She never doubted that any of it was a lie.

But the truth was that it was all a lie. Every single bit of it. A lie handcrafted by the only people that she had trusted in this world.

Which was why she was now choosing to put her trust in one of the strangest people she'd ever met in her life. She had to trust Jonathan.

She opened her eyes, confused and afraid. She missed it. She missed it all. She missed Alicante, she missed her old mother, her old brother, she missed Simon.

In front of them was a church, old and covered in cobwebs. Clary turned around to glare at Jonathan in disbelief. He'd betrayed her. "You told me that you were going to take me to my brother! Not some stupid old church _away _from the city!"

"This _is _the Institute, dear. This is the place you told me to take you, and it's anything but stupid." He spoke in an odd way, Clary noted, not that it mattered in any way.

Clary angrily marched toward the door, eager to prove that she was right and he was wrong, that he'd taken her to the wrong place. Her hand was on the knob and she pulled it open. "I told you that this is just a stupid-

The door swung open and revealed another metal door underneath, and a machine scanned over her face. "Who are you?" A male voice asked. "If you're from the Circle then you have 5 seconds before I blow you up where you stand."

"What?" Clary asked, panic rising up through her voice, looking behind her for Jonathan.

"She's with me." All of a sudden Jonathan was next to her, looking right into the machine.

"And who the hell are you?" The voice asked. "I'll shoot you."

Clary realized that he had a black wig on but didn't question it. "Verlac. Jonathan Verlac. I'm here to see Aline."

Clary backed up and hid behind Jonathan. She had no clue what was going on, much less why there was a freaking metal door behind a wooden one 2 miles away from Idris, inside an abandoned church nonetheless.

The metal doors opened before she could even blink and Jonathan pulled her inside with him but her grip on him quickly fell away and she was staring at an asian girl that looked like she was a bit older than Jonathan run up and throw her arms around him. She instinctively stepped back and bumped into somebody else.

"Woah woah woah." The same voice of the person who'd been speaking through the machine was in front of her, but he looked very different than she'd expected. His hair was spiked upwards in a way she'd never seen before and the eyeliner around his eyes made them look even bigger. **(forgive me, I know nothing about makeup and have never even touched it before.) **"Watch it, biscuit."

"S-sorry." She stuttered. Normally, she would've responded with something a bit more… let's just say rude.

She turned her attention back to Jonathan and the girl, who were finally done with their… reunion. "Clary, your brother's out on a mission." The girl said.

"What sort of _mission_?" She said, her eyes narrow. "And who are you?"

"I'm Aline. Aline Penhallow. Jonathan's cousin." _Ah, _Clary thought. _The cousin he was visiting. _

"Where's my brother?" Clary said, returning back to her original motive. She needed to find her brother and demand an explanation.

"Don't you have any other questions? Like what is this place, who are we, what are we doing here? That's what your brother asked when he got here."

"Can you just get on with it and tell me what the fuck is going on so that I can get on with my life? Please?" Clary said.

Aline sighed. "You really are just like your mother."

"How do you know my mother?"

"She founded us."

"What do you mean, _us?_" Clary said in disbelief. Her mother had started an organization? An organization that hid itself inside an abandoned church and fought people called… _the Circle? _This was the craziest thing she'd heard since she'd found out that potato chips cause more weight gain than any other food**(dunno if that's true, just googled 'random fun facts')**.

"Us. The shadowhunters." Aline said as if it were the most normal thing a person could possibly say, which in fact- it wasn't.

Clary shook her head. "Shadowhunters? My mom? You're not making any sense."

Aline chuckled. "Should I try to explain?'"

"Yes." Clary said, a murderous look on her face.

"Sit down and get ready for the longest story you've ever heard in your life." Aline said, pointing at a fuzzy cushion in front of a TV with gadgets that Clary had never seen before today.

**Hey. Thanks for reading. I typed this all out in exactly an hour and it's the most I've written in a month. I'm a bit rusty because I haven't exactly written every single day in a… while. (Let's say 5 months). The last time I felt satisfied with a chapter was when I was writing Not Whole Without You, so.. Yeah. Thanks for reading. Review. Favorite. Follow, and I'll see you on the friday after the week I come back from vacay. Love ya.**

**~S**


	5. Our Fate is Beckoning

**Hey guys! I'm finally back from Japan and I feel great. The school year is right around the corner and even though I'm busy, I've been keeping up with my writing schedule and I even have some prewritten chapters incase I'm too busy to update. In case you don't know, my updating schedule for this fic is every Friday. Thank you so much to my supporters, and I'm sorry if I didn't respond to PMs(private messages) while on vacation, I'll make sure to respond to them as soon as possible if I haven't already. Incase you didn't know, my PMs are always open to everybody and I always respond eventually. :) Thanks so much for the continuous support and I'm glad to be back.**

**~S**

**Previously: **_**Clary shook her head. "Shadowhunters? My mom? You're not making any sense." **_

_**Aline chuckled. "Should I try to explain?'"**_

"_**Yes." Clary said, a murderous look on her face.**_

"_**Sit down and get ready for the longest story you've ever heard in your life." Aline said.**_

"So you're telling me that my mother founded a gang of people that you call… _Shadowhunters_ that fight and murder members of the _Circle, _which is a gang of people that basically goes around murdering innocent people based on their standards of what is the best person? They look through classified files to pick and choose who gets to… live? And the Circle is run by a man literally named after a holiday with his son, Sebastian? Like, Sebastian the crab from the little mermaid?" Clary said, shaking her head. This couldn't be true. It couldn't be possible. There was no way.

"I don't have to repeat myself, do I?" Aline responded shortly after her.

"No… but you're not making any sense. My mother is terrible at hiding things from me. She couldn't have been running an organization from the inside that apparently my best friend and brother were a part of." Clary took a deep breath. "And most importantly, why the hell did my mother never tell me any of this?"

"Because Valentine is the man that killed your father. Your father's name was Michael Wayland. Your brother was five years old, and you were yet to be born. Your brother had no choice but to be brought into this, Clary. But your mother decided that she didn't need more than one child affected by something so dark. She saw what it did to her son. She didn't need to know what it did to her daughter."

"That's bullshit. My mother was a single mother. She was always a single mother. Jace is only related to me by my mother. That's what she told me." Clary didn't understand. She couldn't understand. How could it be possible for her mother to hide such a thing from just her? This had to be a lie. It had to be a different Jocelyn, a different Jace.

Aline looked at her for a moment in surprise before continuing what she was saying. "Your brother was five years old when he saw Valentine and his men come into his home at midnight, Jocelyn asleep upstairs. He saw his father, Michael Wayland, in the doorway, holding a knife and pointing it straight at Valentine." Aline said softly. "Wayland told Jace to hide, and he did, but he didn't hide in a place where he could not see anything. Jace saw as his father was eventually overpowered and shot right where he stood. Jace saw his father murdered before his eyes and couldn't do anything." Aline's eyes were right on Clary's. "'To love is to destroy,' Jace says. Have you ever wondered why he leaves at night, why he has a haunted look in his eyes of something so traumatic that is not to be spoken of?"

Clary shook her head for what seemed like the millionth time. "No. No, Jace's father and my mom had a one night stand at a club-

"How can you not believe that something is true when all of the facts lay right before your eyes?" Aline said before the sound of the door opening in the distance disrupted them. Aline stood up. "That's your brother. Jocelyn is on a mission right now." Clary started to get up, eager to see her brother, but Aline pushed her down onto the chair. Normally, Clary would've protested, but this definitely was a day that was nowhere near normal.

Clary listened to their conversation intently.

"Did you find him?"

"Sebastian's location is still unknown, but Hodge turned against us." Jace said in a bitter tone. "When I get my hands on Valentine, I swear I will rip him apart limb by limb and pour acid on his skin without any mercy."

Clary put a hand to her mouth. She'd never thought that her brother could be like this. All she'd ever thought of her brother was that he was annoying and stupid; a typical older brother. She'd never thought that at twenty years old, Jace would be speaking of tearing a man apart almost casually.

"But other than that, there were no casualties." Jace said, "Besides Hodge. I killed that bastard." Jace started to walk away, but Aline stopped him.

"Your sister's here."

"Does she know?"

"Not all of it, but yes. She knows." Aline gestured towards where Clary was sitting, and well… listening.

Before she knew it, Jace was shaking her. "Clary."

She slapped him before withdrawing, her hand shaking. She looked around instinctively for Jonathan, who had gone a half hour before. "How could you hide all of this from me?"

"I didn't want to, Clary. Mom made me. She didn't want you to be a part of this." Jace said quietly. "Mom was pregnant with you when dad died. She didn't cry. She ran with me, she ran out of the city with me to Alicante. She started fighting back. She started the Shadowhunters, she when out on late night trips to Idris when I was just five. When I had no clue whether she was coming back at night, I was scared, Clary. I was terrified. She was pregnant but she was fighting. Six months later you were born, and the first thing that she decided that she didn't want you to know the dark side of the world. She wanted you to grow up in a carefree environment without the fear that somebody would kill you or the people that you love." Jace sighed. "You've seen what this lifestyle has done to me. I've killed people, Clary. I've killed more people than you can imagine."

"But why did you guys hide all of this from me? Why did you make me think that my father abandoned our mom when she was pregnant? Why did you make me think that all of the late nights mom stayed out was for work when she was really out with you… killing people? Why didn't you just tell me the truth? Did you introduce me to Simon just because he was part of mom's gang? Was he really my best friend? Did you get rid of him?" Clary didn't know what to think anymore. She looked around for Jonathan but remembered that he had left. "Where's mom? I need her to confirm all of this, because right now, it sounds to me like you're crazy. All of you are crazy."

"Clary, it wasn't my choice to hide this from you. And Simon- Simon was part of the Shadowhunters, yes."

"I just… I don't understand, Jace. Why-What-"

"I know you have a lot of questions, Clary. But I love you, and I'll try to help you figure this out. There's no use hiding anything from you anymore." Jace said softly. "You don't have to fight or kill people… I'll just answer all your questions, and if you want to become a part of us… I won't be against it, and neither will mom."

Clary's hands trembled. "Do you really kill people?"

"Yes."

"Are they murderers too?" Clary said. "If they are… I guess… I don't know…"

"Most of them. But all of them have hurt people. I swear on my life. I would never hurt somebody the way that Valentine did to me."

Clary's shoulders relaxed. "Where's mom?"

The door swung open and Jocelyn walked through. Clary went silent and just sat there, quietly listening as Jocelyn's footsteps came closer and… _clack. _Jocelyn dropped all of her things as soon as she saw her daughter looking straight at her.

"Mom-

Jocelyn looked at Jace. "Did you bring her here? Why would you bring her here? I told you-

"She came here with Verlac. Jonathan Verlac."

"Aline's cousin from France? How?" Jocelyn said angrily. "She wasn't supposed to find out. She was never supposed to find out!" Her fingers were clenched around something in her pocket. "And to think that I thought today would have a good ending-

"Wait what? What happened?" Jace exclaimed all of a sudden.

"I…" Jocelyn glanced back at Clary and shut her mouth. "How much does she know? If she doesn't know about…"

Jace cleared his throat. "She knows everything, mom. It doesn't matter anymore."

Jocelyn's shoulders sagged. "Alright then. Clary… do you want to know what I did today?"

"Um… duh?" Clary said, glaring at her mother, all of the fury from being told that her mother and her brother had been secretly murdering people in the middle of the night without her knowing starting to sink into her. "Don't hide anything else from me."

Jocelyn's hands went into her pocket, and Clary suddenly realized that there was blood dripping from her pocket and it was falling onto the wooden floor. Jocelyn pulled out a lock of hair from her pocket.

"Um… all I see is a fucking hair…? Why does that even matter?"

"Wait." Jace said suddenly. "Does that mean…?"

"Wait, Clary. I'll explain." Jocelyn said quietly, looking straight at her daughter. Clary wasn't sure about anything. How could a hair be so important? Especially one that looked like an old man's? "We located the Morgenstern mansion last night."

"Morgenstern?"

"Valentine and his son's mansion. We finally found it."

"But where's the proof?" Jace asked her.

The door opened with a clang and Jonathan walked through. "What happened? Why's everybody panicking?" His hair was jet black, which almost made it difficult for Clary to recognize him. He had contacts in, too. His eyes weren't as black as before, and they were a normal color this time.

"We found the Morgensterns." Jocelyn replied.

Jonathan's eyes went wide. "That's great. What are we going to do?"

"You don't have an accent." Jace said all of a sudden. "Are you really from France?"

Jonathan took a step back and stumbled, but managed to keep himself upright. "I went to an international school, so my English is better than most people that I know."

"Ah." Jace said, nodding. "I think Aline said something like that to me earlier."

Jocelyn cleared her throat. "This kind of hair was scattered all over the place, but it beats me." She shrugged. "But it's proof that the Morgensterns live there. I already DNA tested it. That's what the good news was."

"I've got to go." Jonathan exclaimed.

"But you just got here-" Clary began to protest. Honestly, if there was anybody she trusted right now, it was Jonathan.

"I'm really sorry, but I really have to go-

Sirens started to ring all around them. "It's the circle!" Jocelyn exclaimed as Jace instinctively handed a gun to everybody around him.

"We'll finish this conversation later, Clary. I promise. Stay here and don't leave until we come back. I don't want you getting hurt." Jace pushed her down onto the chair just like Aline had minutes before.

Before she knew it, everybody was gone and Clary was alone again. Confused, scared, and alone. She had to find Jonathan and make him explain everything to her before things got worse. She needed to understand.

She grabbed a knife off of the counter and slipped it into her pocket, running out into the unknown once more.

**thanks for reading and expect another chapter next week.**

**Follow, Favorite, Review!**

**~S**


	6. Mysteries Unfold

Hey, I'm back, and I'm(surprisingly) on schedule! Thank you for all of the follows, I really appreciate it. Also, have any of you read the Hunger Games? I've been working on writing a fic for that, so if you'd like, look out for that one. How are you? Oh my god, I just checked the traffic graph for this fic and we're at 1000+ views! *celebratory trumpet music* Thank you so, so, so much for a fucking average of almost 90 views the last time I updated! This really makes me happy to know that you enjoy this.

This chapter is dedicated to everybody.

~S

Clary couldn't find Jonathan anywhere. After all, it had been around a half hour since Jonathan and the rest of them had left. She'd been stupid to think that Jonathan would be anywhere nearby, much less careless enough to let an untrained bystander see him while he was out on the hunt. No- hunt was a bad word to use. It reminded her of the words that had been written on the walls of the shed where she'd found Simon's body. It was still yet to be found by the cops. Maybe the body wasn't there anymore. Maybe-

She shook her head and continued to walk. Surely Jonathan was out here somewhere.

But still… she'd been walking for around twenty minutes. She saw a person walking in the distance all of a sudden and followed along, praying that it was Jonathan.

One look at his eyes made it certain who it was. There was no mistaking it, because his eyes were even darker than the sky at midnight. The boy standing in front of her was Jonathan. The boy that saved her from being murdered when she was lost in the middle of a dark alleyway. Clary trusted him. She had faith that wouldn't hurt her, at least not in the way that Jocelyn and Jace had today.

She made sure that Jonathan wasn't watching her before she started to trail behind him. Sadly, it seemed like Jonathan had some sort of crazy sixth sense that made him realize that she was there right away. "Who's there?" His voice had an edge to it, and there was a coldness to his face as well. "I won't hesitate to kill you."

Clary stumbled and fell straight through the clearing and right in front of Jonathan. Jonathan quickly hoisted her up and into the shadows. "Are you crazy? Why are you out at a time like this? Valentine and his son could be anywhere!" He put his phone back inside his pocket quickly and lightly pushed Clary back in the direction of the institute.

"I need to know the truth, Jonathan. The full truth, no lies. I can't have everybody start to leave me alone as soon as I start getting answers."

"But why come here right now? Why not wait until there aren't… I don't know, people trying to kill us and your family? Do you know what's at stake right now?" Jonathan shoved her towards an alleyway in an angry manner that she'd never seen before. "Now do me a favor and stay safe so your brother and mother don't come kill me, alright?"

"Jon-" Clary sighed, realizing that he'd already disappeared. But.. what Jonathan had just said gave her an eerie feeling. Jace and her mom would kill him? It was probably just a joke but the way he phrased it somehow gave her chills. But she couldn't focus on that. Why had she thought running after somebody that she barely even knew.. heck… didn't even know was a good idea in the first place? He probably thought she was stupid, clueless, and just… the thought of how she probably looked to Jonathan made her feel utterly hopeless. What had she been thinking? She wasn't good enough to fight like her family, and she definitely wasn't smart enough to help out with their plans. She was just an insignificant little girl in the big scheme of things. Not somebody that anybody would trust in anything important.

She should've just been obedient and stayed back at the institute. If she didn't go back to the institute by the time everybody got back, she'd probably get yelled at for being so careless. She didn't matter enough to them for them to care about her wellbeing in the first place, though. They might not even notice that she was gone.

She looked to her side and held her hand out, pretending that Simon was next to her, keeping her company and comforting her, and for a moment she thought that she saw him. There was an overwhelming amount of loneliness that came along with his death. She hadn't realized how much his absence has affected her until now.

The sky started to darken and she felt a drop of rain hit her head. She laughed tiredly. "I guess the sky is crying along with me." Wow, way to make everything more depressing. She said to herself. Clary took this in a comforting way and let the rain wipe her tears away. She held her locket close to her heart and listened to the sound of the rain.

Clary woke up around thirty minutes later, soaking wet, a stranger shaking her. "Come with me." In her sleepy haze, she didn't know who was dragging her along, but she felt a sense of comfort from whatever it was.

After ten minutes of being dragged through the city that she loathed, she rubbed her eyes and looked around her to realize that they had escaped the city and were out in the middle of a field that looked down upon the city. The sun was rising and it was beautiful.

"Where did you take me?" Clary said in wonder.

"This is where I come when I'm worried… or scared… or whatever." Clary realized where that voice came from.

Jonathan was there, his arms crossed.

"Why take me here when you left me in the rain for hours? Okay- hold up. First you tell me that I'm not getting answers, then you tell me I'm getting answers later, and then you say that you're giving them to me now?" Clary sighed. "How the hell am I supposed to believe that I'm going to get the real answers when people keep lying to me?" Clary took in a deep breath. "You also took me to an abandoned church full of people I barely even know and just straight up left when you're the only person that I trust right now! Apparently my brother is a murderer, my best friend was part of my mother's gang, my mother started a fucking mafia gang or something, and my father was murdered by a crime lord! Nothing has made sense tonight besides you saving me, and that's fucking crazy, because you're the craziest person I've ever met!"

"Clary-

"And can you also explain to me why the fuck you took me to the middle of nowhere to 'explain' things? This isn't a fucking CW romance drama where all people do is get dragged to random places by people who like taking their shirts off. (No offense, but *wink wink* *cough* Riverdale) And if this is normal to you, then please, please use a fucking sedative and erase my memories, because my life was much better before all of this shit happened to me!" Clary pressed her hand against her locket. "I'm not even sure if this locket was really my father's, either! Maybe it's a shitty necklace that my mom bought for 2 bucks on amazon!"

"I don't know, alright? And stop dragging me into a mess that you created all by yourself! I don't even know why I brought you here, because I sure as hell don't give a shit about what you know and don't know!" Jonathan said in a way that made Clary unsure whether he was talking to her or trying to convince himself that he in fact, did not give a shit.

"Then why did you drag me halfway across the city and into the countryside to yell at me and tell me that you don't give a shit? Because it seems to me that you do!"

"I have no fucking clue. I don't want to care about you, but you seem so weak and hopeless that-" Jonathan started laughing, the anger that was previously in his voice gone. "You sounded so stupid." His voice went high pitched and whiny, saying, "It seems to me that you do." He mimicked her.

"You moron, I-" Clary's voice trailed off when she saw the sunrise in the distance, giving the grass an almost heavenly green-gold glow. The aftermath of the rain the night before ensured that a rainbow covered almost half of the sky, and dew droplets coated all over the blades of grass, making the view a wonderful sight to see. Now Clary understood why Jonathan would bring her here. It wasn't just the view of the countryside, but also the city. The oranges, yellows and reds from the sunrise covered the tall buildings from Idris and for once making it look… wonderful. The feeling that she got from looking at the view was exhilarating, and took away all of the previous anger from being dragged to this place. How could she be angry when this was what Jonathan had taken her here to see? Instead of saying everything that she had been about to say, she smiled and said, "It's beautiful. I… wish I could draw it."

"Could you?" Jonathan said suddenly, as if nothing had mattered before that, but that was quickly covered up with a look of amusement and exhilaration filled the air as the time that had stopped started moving again at full speed. Clary could feel her heart skip a couple beats.

"I don't have any paints or pencils-

"Tomorrow at sunrise. I'll meet you here. Tell no one." Jonathan said. "I have some things I need to take care of before then.

Clary had no clue about what he was saying, but took it with a grain of salt as he often said things that made absolutely no sense at all. All that was in her heart right now was the image of Jonathan standing there while the sun rose above her surroundings and the urge to paint everything she saw.

She looked back at where Jonathan had been, but he was gone again, and she was alone. Alone again.

Tomorrow, she said to herself in her heart. Tomorrow whether she got the answers she wanted or not, she would get to see him. She would get to see the boy that had made her feel a way she hadn't in a long time. She believed, no… She knew that Jonathan would be there tomorrow.

What did you think about the chapter? Personally, I think the first half sucked and the ending was good! I have no clue what's gonna happen next because I'm not an outline person, but hopefully… it'll be good. I have so so much planned for this story and I'm really excited for what's coming next. So in the next couple of chapters I'll be more focused on Clary and the shadowhunters instead of Clary and Jonathan so that I can fully plan out what'll happen with them at sunrise. Review, follow, favorite! :)

~S


	7. All the Stories

**I'm so grateful that you've continued to read my crappy writing and I hope that you enjoy this chapter. I'm always a chapter ahead in my writing now so this has become easier for me to focus on my schoolwork and writing. Thanks for the support :)I had no idea this fanfic was going to have any sort of views at all besides my regular audience but...19 followers? 1000+ views? With just 6 chapters? Wow. I really don't know what I'd do about myself if I didn't have fanfics lol. Early-ish update this week because I have something to do on Friday.**

**~S**

**Sources for the chapter(where I got the information for the description of Raphael):**

** /c/shadowhunters/page/item/raphael-santiago/4lY8_Y1svIJpg2g5kPq3VrXvMvY0GKWGrV**

"Dammit Aline! Where's your cousin?!" Jocelyn yelled from the command center into Aline's earpiece. Aline and Jonathan were supposed to go on a mission that day, but Jonathan was yet to arrive at the institute.

As soon as Clary had come back to the institute, she was filled in on the current situation. Jocelyn had chosen Aline and Jonathan to set fire to the Morgenstern mansion before the rest of the shadowhunters went to finish the job(which meant murdering them).

Clary remembered what Jonathan had said to her. "_I've got something to take care of tomorrow." _Clary wanted to tell her mother so that she would stop taking it out on Aline. It wasn't Aline's fault.

Clary opened her mouth to speak. "Jonathan said-" She covered her mouth as she remembered something else that he'd said. "_Tell no one." _She would keep his promise. If she broke the promise, who knew what Jonathan might do.

"Jonathan said what?" Jocelyn said in a frustrated tone.

"Nevermind." Clary said, and soon after that, all of Jocelyn's attention went right back to the command center and the mission. Clary wasn't used to thisbecause when they were at home, Jocelyn never took her attention away.

"If Jonathan isn't coming then we're sending Raphael." Jocelyn said firmly. "I know he's only fifteen, but he can do it. I'm sure. Aline, protect him and make sure he doesn't get injured. We don't want any casualties." **(It says that Raphael was turned at the age of 15, so I'm going with that instead of saying that he's 70.)**

It was crazy how different Jocelyn was in the institute. In here, she was like a warlord. At home, she was just… a mom. Clary realized that this was what her mom was truly was like, without the pressure to hide all of her secrets. Clary realized that… because of her, Jocelyn couldn't be herself.

She ignored the jerking feeling of pain that the realization caused her and turned her attention to Raphael. Raphael definitely didn't look his age. His hair and eyes were black, but his eyes weren't nearly as black as Jonathan's, if there were even different shades of black to begin with. His hair was slightly wavy but it wasn't as curly as her hair. There was a scar shaped like a cross on his neck where people normally wore one. "Woah. I thought you were like, twenty. But you're my age."

"What's so interesting about that, brat?"

_Okay… _Clary thought and backed up a bit. How was somebody so young so terrifying? "I was just pointing something out. You don't have to be a dick about it. If you don't like it when people say things about you, then I don't know how you've survived so far in society."

"I do what I want." Raphael snapped.

"Jeez." Clary said, looking back at her mother. "How is this dude useful in any sort of situation? Is he always like this or is he going through some sort of phase?"

"You little-"

Clary held up her finger. "If I wanted to talk to a bitch, I would've gotten a dog."

"Fuck y-

"I'm not done." She walked slowly over to her brother's backpack while Raphael watched her in silence and- _aha! _Just as she suspected, they were in there. Clary took a condom out of the bag and placed it on his head. "You should wear this. If you're gonna be a dick, might as well dress like one." She took a deep breath. "I. Rest. My. Fucking. Case."

Raphael threw the condom off his head and glared at her. "I'll fucking kill y-"

"Raphael. Clary. You can fight after Raphael is done burning down that mansion, alright? This is our top priority, not a fight between two hormonal teenagers." Jocelyn said. Jocelyn was a whole lot stricter here than she was at home, that was for sure. Clary just couldn't get used to it.

"Fine." They both said at the same time.

Raphael turned to her for a second. "My middle finger gets a boner every time I see you." Then he walked out with Aline. Clary could see the lighters in their hands along with what was probably bombs inside the backpacks they were carrying.

And although Raphael was the strangest and rudest boy her age that she'd ever met, she kinda wanted to see him again. Besides, it was fun being rude to him.

"Is there any way we can see what they're doing over there?" She asked.

—

Clary has been watching what they had been doing consistently for the past 30 minutes. They'd reached the mansion after driving- _although Raphael didn't technically have a driver's license - _and started to pull out there lighters and light the bushes around the house on fire to make it more difficult for the people inside to get out. Aline was currently in the process of setting timers on the bombs.

Her mother and Jace, along with the rest of the Shadowhunters had left already and were on their way so that they could help with the killing. Jace of course, had wanted to be the one to oversee Valentine's last breath. Clary didn't want to believe that her brother was capable of such things, but clearly she'd been wrong about a lot of things in her life.

Clary watched Aline through the camera; Aline was putting the four bombs she'd brought with her down in different places- the four corners of the mansion to be exact. Clary's question was how Valentine hadn't noticed this. Of course, it was around 8pm but she didn't think that the city's most well known crime lord wouldn't have any sort of security waiting for them somewhere. Everytime Clary heard a sound, she would flinch. She had no clue how Aline could handle something like this.

She wanted everybody to come back from this mission, but the way her mother spoke made it seem as if that wasn't true, which terrified her right to her core. If Aline weren't able to make it back… Aline had been so kind to her so far, and apparently she had a think for Jace, so if that never happened… Clary would never feel alright with that.

And Raphael- that annoying little dick that made her stomach somersault just a little, nowhere near as much as it did when she was with Jonathan. The bickering session that they'd had was just enough to make her worry about him not coming back and the effect that it would have on her.

If Jace didn't make it back, it would be devastating. Even though she didn't quite understand what was going on quite at the moment, one thing was for certain- Jace Fray was her older brother. She'd lived with him for as long as she could remember and she loved him with all of her heart.

Her mother, the person that preventing disaster from hitting Idris for… years and years without end. If she died, not only would it affect her but it would affect everybody else in the institute.

No matter who died, there would be a long lasting effect. No matter who- except for Clary. She didn't matter enough to anybody there besides maybe her brother and mom. And possibly Jonathan, but it was too early to tell if he really did care about her. But whatever happened to anybody wouldn't matter if they didn't kill Valentine and Sebastian. Then all of their efforts would mean nothing.

That's why Clary pushed all of her thoughts away and decided that she wasn't going to get in the way this time, because that would be exactly how things would go wrong, and it would be all her fault again. She didn't want to feel the guilt of being the person responsible for messing everything up.

"I have the bombs set and ready to go in… five minutes. Raphael?" Aline said through her mic.

"I set the grass on fire, yeah. Now get out of the way before you get blown up." Raphael's voice didn't have its usual snarkiness to it. Clary couldn't tell whether or not it was sarcasm, fear, or even kindness.

But judging from Raphael's face, Clary would consider it as words of kindness.

Aline and Raphael took off in opposite directions from the different corners of the mansion that they had been at, and took their places around a 100 feet away from where the bombs were so that they were sure to not blow up.

Clary couldn't ignore the uneasy feeling that she got when she could see from the cameras set up at the control center that the bomb's timer suddenly stopped. If she'd looked around thirty seconds prior, she might've seen who stopped the timer. Was it Aline? Her mom? Raphael? Had something gone wrong? Had the mission been compromised? Or was she just an uneducated, insignificant little girl that didn't know how bombs worked?

Clary took in a deep breath and prayed to whatever god would hear her that this mission would work. If this didn't work, then…

She saw a flash of Jace in the back of her mind, ready to murder Valentine.

A piece of her wanted to as well. This was the man that had hurt Jace to the point where he thought that _to love was to destroy. _This was the man that had ruined her chance of ever having a normal family, the man that murdered her father.

But Clary had to stay here and watch in order to make sure that the plan worked in the first place.

For a second, Clary thought that she saw a flash of color pass by the camera attached to Raphael's back.

When a second flash of color passed by the camera, she was sure that she wasn't just seeing things. She was sure that somebody was there.

And she didn't know whether this person was on their team or not. But when she saw a knife sticking out of the person's pocket, she didn't hesitate.

"Rapha-

**The queen of cliffhangers is back again. I hope you guys liked this chapter, because this is my favorite chapter so far. What do you guys think? Do you like Raphael? I will see you next week and answer all of your burning questions. **


	8. Legends That We're Told

**Hey guys. I just reread Not Whole Without You and realized how much better my writing is when I actually take the time to focus and edit, and I've been in a dark place because I feel like everything about me is declining and I'm working really hard to improve that. So hopefully over the course of this fic I'll improve. Hopefully by a lot. Anyways, thank you to everybody who leaves reviews and favorites. **

**Last time: **_**For a second, Clary thought that she saw a flash of color pass by the camera attached to Raphael's back.**_

_**When a second flash of color passed by the camera, she was sure that she wasn't just seeing things. She was sure that somebody was there. **_

_**And she didn't know whether this person was on their team or not. But when she saw a knife sticking out of the person's pocket, she didn't hesitate.**_

"_**Rapha-**_

**~S**

"Raphael! Raphael, watch out!" Clary screamed as the person behind him lunged forward just as Raphael was attempting to turn around to get a better view. She covered her mouth with her hands as she saw Raphael wrestling the strange man- no, boy. The boy was wearing a hood and a mask that covered everything but his eyes, which were in fact pitch black. Raphael obviously was at a disadvantage, first of all because he was shorter, and the boy had a knife. A _very _sharp knife.

A freezing cold realization ran through her body in a way that made it feel like her whole body was frozen in time, too frightened to say anything. If the boy in the hood had turned off the bomb, that would mean that it wouldn't go off and that the plan was ruined. That their hopes of killing Valentine and his son were no longer something to cling to. Although there was a fire on the opposite end of the mansion, that could very well be put out as soon it was discovered, as the mansion most likely had fire extinguishers. The bomb was supposed to be a distraction in order to take the attention of the thing that was supposed to kill the Morgensterns- the Shadowhunters that were waiting to ambush. If the bomb wasn't in place, the fire would be put out and then they'd be done for. They'd needed a quick explosion to start off there work, but now that there was no start to the plan, there would be no ending to it, either.

"What's going on? Clary, what's happening? Why is Raphael not responding?" Jocelyn's voice came echoing through the speakers, genuine worry echoing through the empty rooms of the Institute in an eerie manner. "Why aren't the bombs going off? Clary?"

"T-there's somebody there. H-he's after Raphael." Clary could hear her voice trembling as she saw the boy strike at Raphael. _No. No. No. _She couldn't freeze right now, not when she was actually going to be useful. She had to respond to them. She tried to move her hands towards the button to reply but her fingers wouldn't move. The sinking feeling in her gut was getting worse and she could hear her gasps through her very own earpiece. _Why are you like this? Why can't you be useful for once in your life instead of a waste of space? _Clary blinked back tears. _You can't cry, either. What's wrong with you? Why are you crying instead of answering your mother?_

Almost as if reading her mind, Jocelyn started to soothe her daughter. "Listen Clary. Nobody's going to die, alright? Calm down." Clary's gasps started to calm down and she could control her breath as long as she focused. And she _needed _to focus. She hit the button, ready to reply.

"Not Raphael. This wasn't supposed to happen. Goddamit where's Jonathan? Why didn't you let me go, Jocelyn?" Jace's voice was full of rage, but he continued to speak in the calm way that he always did to Clary. "Clary, have you gotten a good look at this guy's face?"

Startled by Jace's calm, Clary started to stutter once again. "N-No, I-" Just as if answering her prayers that she could be the least bit useful, the hood that was covering the first half of the boy's face fell off, and although there was a mask covering his features, when the hoodie fell away, his white-blonde hair was revealed. Clary flinched backwards, remembering the eerie feeling that she felt when Jace had explained what Sebastian Moregnstern looked like, just in case he came attacking the base while everybody was gone.

"_Everybody else is either busy tonight or is gonna be with us, so there'll be nobody to protect you. Even though Valentine himself probably won't have the guts to show himself here, his son might. Black eyes. Darker than the sky at night here." Jace laughed bitterly. "Blond hair, white as snow but not quite." _

_Then Jace had left to go talk on the phone with somebody named "Alec."_

She remembered thinking about that night two days ago when she'd met Jonathan in that dark alleyway, and how she felt like she couldn't move. How she felt like a little animal being hunted by a predator, and how eerily similar Jonathan had seemed to Jace's description of Sebastian Morgenstern. Of course, Jonathan had told her that black was his natural hair color, and that he felt more comfortable wearing the wig over his hair rather than showing off his bleached hair. According to him, the white hair was an accident. As for his eyes- those had to be contacts, because Jace said that he hadn't met anybody but Sebastian with eyes that black. Jonathan definitely couldn't be a Morgenstern. He was nothing like them. Jonathan was kind, compassionate, and vulnerable. According to Jace, Sebastian was arrogant, terrifying, and invincible. Those were polar opposites.

But Clary couldn't ignore the feeling she felt when she'd heard Jace's description.

Could Jonathan be Sebastian Morgenstern?

Clary ignored the way her stomach dropped and chills ran through her body when she thought about the fact that Jonathan could possibly be Sebastian, because the feeling didn't last long. The next thing she knew, she was feeling guilty. There was no way in hell that Jonathan and Sebastian were the same person. Jonathan had literally talked about France. Jonathan had grown up in Paris. That was a fact.

Clary focused back on the camera. This boy was right at the Morgenstern mansion, and he had the signature hair and the pitch black eyes that Jace had told her about. It seemed like all of a sudden, her voice was back. "It's Sebastian! Jace, it's him!"

Clary saw Jace drop everything except a rifle and run towards where Raphael was. Jace shot at the sky 3 times in a row, which was something that Clary had learned during her brother's way to the mansion that it was his brother's way of giving a death warning, because they'd ran into a few of Valentine's followers on the way, and Clary had had the pleasure of witnessing it all from a huge television with a communicator and earpiece. Jace would always shoot the sky three times before he would go in for the kill.

The look on his face was stone cold as he ran towards where Raphael was and shot once, twice, three times at Sebastian. Sebastian dodged twice before getting hit once in the shoulder. He winced in pain and rolled to the side before getting up and continuing to fight as if nothing had happened, making sure that he was never in the same place for more than 10 seconds so that Jace wouldn't have the chance to shoot, at least not where Sebastian was. Jace also had to be careful that he didn't accidentally shoot Raphael, either. Jace couldn't even run to them because of the several booby traps that were now back to how they were before Raphael and Aline broke in. Part of the reason why Raphael was chosen in the place of Jonathan was because of his knack for cracking codes and hacking through booby traps, keys, and more.

There were too many problems with what was going biggest problem that Clary noticed was that the fire set by Aline was starting to grow larger, and if Valentine were to wake up, then everybody would be in danger. If she didn't say something now, then she would regret it for the rest of her life and maybe if there was a life after that, she would regret it then as well.

Before she got the chance to speak, Raphael did. "Aline, run! Throw some of your hand grenades at the mansion-" He gasped for air. "It's better than nothing, it's better than me dying for nothi-"

The fact that Clary had to just sit there and watch somebody that she genuinely cared about gasp for air in a way that made her fear for his life was just cruel. Utterly cruel.

Aline listened, unwavering, and threw her three hand grenades at the mansion and ran as far as she could until the three grenades blew and she was thrown away from where Raphael and Sebastian were fighting each other. She cried out when a piece of shrapnel lodged itself into her thigh and blood gushed out.

Jace couldn't move to help Raphael, a wall of fire surrounding him without mercy, not letting him help when he was the only one who could. Thankfully, Aline was close enough to the point where he and Jocelyn could get her and start to put pressure on her wound. Aline's black hair was plastered across her head and she took deep breaths, her hand hovering over her bleeding thigh. "Raphael is-" Aline started, before Jace stopped her.

"I know." Jace managed to say bitterly. Clary didn't know what was going through his mind but she wished that hadn't looked at any of this. She didn't think that somebody who had just explained everything that she'd never known about her life to her just a mere 3 hours prior would be able to get wounded this badly during what was supposed to be a simple mission. "I know, and I can't do a fucking thing about it. I-" Jace snapped what was going to be Aline's splint in half. "I can't-"

Clary couldn't watch that any longer. She shifted her attention to Raphael. Sebastian was repeatedly lunging for Raphael from all sorts of directions, and seemed to have limitless energy although he'd literally been shot in the shoulder. _Jace was right, _Clary thought. _Sebastian is invincible. _He would continue to come at Raphael from the top and bottom, left and right, diagonally and keep shifting the combinations, so as to wear Raphael out. It seemed that during Raphael's tired haze, he couldn't see the pattern. Raphael was panting, and every single time he would stop to catch his breath, Sebastian would come lunging once again, his hair now covered in Raphael's blood. Raphael was bleeding in all sorts of places, and you honestly couldn't tell where because there was so much blood. Clary had to pressure herself not to look away when she realized that Raphael might not live through this battle.

Every single time Raphael dodged, there was a wheezing noise that came from his lungs. It was his body's way of saying, _I can't do this anymore. _Clary never thought that Raphael could be this vulnerable, especially not after their stupid luttle argument that had happened just an hour ago. She had to bite her tongue to stop herself from screaming when she saw that one of Sebastian's knives had struck him in the ankle.

Why did everybody she had begun to care about have to suffer like this?

Raphael cried out briefly in pain before having to dodge again. Sebastian was merciless, and all anybody could do was watch, because the fire wall was starting to grow even more fierce, and Jocelyn wouldn't let Jace walk through it, no matter how much he wanted to. Aline had been lucky to be saved, but Raphael… well Raphael might not be so lucky.

Clary prayed that her first and last conversation with Raphael wouldn't be something as stupid as calling each other names. She had wanted to talk more with him, and she- _she would. _She had to. She couldn't lose anybody else, at least not after Simon.

Raphael's wound was oozing with blood, and with every single step he took, he left a puddle of scarlet blood behind.

His face was pale. So pale. It seemed like he would fall over at any moment. _Somebody please just help him. Please. _Clary pleaded to whoever would listen to her. If all of the ignored prayers that she hadn't weren't answered for this moment, then let it be that way. She her fingers hovered over her locket. Aline had told her that the symbol on her locket was the Shadowhunters' symbol. It stood for angelic power.

Everytime Raphael's foot touched the ground, a strangled sounding noise would work it's way through Raphael and into an echoing noise in the area surrounded by the mansion and fire. His dodges were getting slower and slower, while Sebastian continued to get faster and faster, all while nursing the bullet wound in his shoulder. Clary didn't know how he did it.

No wonder he was called the Angel of death.

However, Aline had thrown the grenades. They still had hope, because they wouldn't be leaving having done nothing at all.

Sebastian smiled creepily in the direction of the camera, almost as if he knew it was there, although it was so tiny that he shouldn't be able to. Jace smiled too, watching the mansion burn, but at the same time he still looked hungry for the blood of his enemy.

_Wait, _Clary wanted to say. _It's not over. Please. Help Raphael. _The fire was yet to go out and Raphael was starting to sway on his feet. He was barely escaping the lunges and by now he had no energy left and no hope to live through the rest of the day.

Clary slowly watched Raphael give up the fight, and fall to his knees right as another one of Sebastian's knives sank into his stomach. Clary hated it. Clary hated the fact that there were cameras attached to everything. The fact that she could see everything that was happening but could do nothing about it. The fact that the job of watching through the cameras was assigned to her and not to somebody who was an expert in this.

And almost as if stabbing him in the stomach wasn't enough, Sebastian pulled the knife out, watched Raphael crumple to the ground with heaving breaths before slitting his throat, as if Raphael wasn't going to die with the wound he'd already been given.

Raphael spat in his face. "Fuck you." He started to blink rapidly before it just stopped, and his chest stopped moving mid breath.

Clary couldn't help but slide out of her chair, sink to her knees, and stare into space. What had she just seen? Was this similar to what Valentine had done to her father? Is this the kind of horror that Jace had witnessed when he was only five years old? What if this was the kind of end that Simon had had? When she closed her eyes, she saw Simon's body, and then it flickered and blended into Raphael's.

Her eyes turned bitterly cold as she remembered something. _Jocelyn promised nobody would die. _

If Jonathan had been there, would things have been different? Wouldn't Raphael have not died? Jonathan was obviously older and had more field experience than Raphael. If he'd been here-

Clary shook her head. She shouldn't be blaming people for things that weren't under their control. Jonathan could be injured somewhere else right now, and that could be the reason why he didn't show up. As for Raphael-

Why had she been so horrible? Why did cruel words have to be the last thing that she said to him? Her hands began to tremble. She was a horrible person. Why couldn't she have just said hello and been done with it? Why couldn't she have ignored him? Why did she have to like the liveliness that he'd had to him? Why had she felt like he was one of the only people she'd had a connection with since she'd moved to Idris? And worst of all, why did it hurt so bad?

"You bastard!" She looked back at the cameras, still shaking. The fire had finally gone out. Why hadn't it gone out earlier? Why was the timing like this? Why did it have to be like this? Why? _Why?! _She hit the screen before holding her wrist tightly, heavy waves of pain moving through her arm.

"The hell!" Jace screamed, immediately shooting straight in the direction that Sebastian had been, repeatedly. "Where the hell did he go?! What the fuck! He's going to fucking pay, I swear to god!" Followed by that we're a string of words that Clary had thought she'd never hear coming from her older brother's mouth. Ever. He threw the rifle on the ground and started running towards Raphael's body.

"Ave atque vale, Raphael Santiago." Jace closed Raphael's open eyes before glaring at his mother. "It should've been me there, mom. Why didn't you let me go?!"

_Ave atque vale. Hail and Fairwell. _Clary remembered. The tattoo that Jace had gotten the day he turned eighteen. She remembered looking it up and wondering why he would get something like that.

"Jace, I-" Now she understood why he'd gotten the tattoo. It was because Jace had seen too many things for somebody his age. He needed to be okay with somebody that he knew dying so often. He needed something to cope with. _Ave atque vale. Hail and farewell. _

"You got a boy you've been looking after since he was like, 8… killed! All for what? You could've put me in Jonathan's place, not some kid that deserves more than I ever will! Are you fucking delusional?!"

"I don't want to lose you, Jace! I chose Raphael for a reason! I didn't think anybody would die! I didn't think that they knew that we were coming! It's not that I don't have faith in you, Jace. It's that _I don't fucking want you to die_!" Jocelyn shouted, tears running down her face.

A chill ran through her spine when she realized that somebody must have known that Jonathan was going to be part of the mission. What if he was dead? Why else would Jonathan not have shown up? What if Jonathan was also-

Clary took deep breaths, shaking her head. She would go back to the hill tomorrow and make sure that he was alive. If he didn't show up, then she would-

She didn't want to think about it. She didn't want to think about anything. She hated the fact that her mother had willingly let a 15 year old boy die on her watch. She just wanted to forget about what happened today and draw the sunrise on the hill with a boy, as if she was a normal girl.

But the thing was-

She definitely was far from normal.

**I'm sooo sorry for introducing a character and then killing him. Twice.**

**I actually edited a chapter. I'm so proud of it! Let me know what you think. Also- Clabastian chapter next or introduction to Alec? Plz vote in the reviews, because this actually changes how the storyline works. **

**Follow, favorite, review!**

**~S**


	9. Come to Life

**This should be one of the happier chapters. I think we deserve a break from violence and death for at least one chapter. Oh my god, we passed 2,000 views!**

***disclaimer: I don't own TMI. Otherwise, I'd be rich. Sadly, I'm not.***

**~S**

Despite the fact that she'd gotten almost no sleep, Clary got up about an hour before dawn; she was already anxious about meeting Jonathan. Should she go in something fancy? _No. Stupid. It's not that important, Clary. You're just going to paint._ Clary shook her head. The amount of sleep she'd gotten must've been messing with her head.

Still- she couldn't sleep in when she knew that there were two murderers sleeping beside her in a one-room house. Not that they'd murdered for a bad reason. But at the same time, it did scare her. What if she did something that they didn't like and they came after her? What if they killed her just like how Jace said he would kill Sebastian some day? What if she didn't follow their directions again, or what if somebody else died and they couldn't control their temper and she'd be murdered by a person that she thought could never even hurt a fly?

She'd grown restless over the three hours that they'd been home, not believing their promises to keep her safe. She was just so scared; she was scared that she'd do something wrong and it would end up with her getting hurt. She'd seen Jace shoot his gun at the sky three times in her nightmares- the nightmares where Jace would come running after her and she'd look down, blood dripping from a gaping hole in her stomach that Jace had stabbed. His face was just like how it was earlier that morning when he talked about carving Jonathan's flesh open. Raphael was in that nightmare, too- his eyes would flash open and he'd start screaming at her for living when he was dead after all he'd done… while she'd done nothing.

She was worthless, after all. She'd done absolutely nothing to try and sage Raphael. All that she"d done while everything happened was cream and cry- frozen in place. She could've and should've warned him earlier should've set off the alarms attached to their cameras before the fire happened so that the backup could've come and waged him before it was too late.

She leaned against the sink and watched as the water from the one leaky faucet they had dropped onto her hand slowly and she splashed some of it on her face. She glanced at the mirror and looked away, She looked quite terrible, to say the least. There were dark bags under her eyes from a lack of sleep and purple bruises all over her arms and legs. Her hair was sticking out in multiple places because she didn't care to brush it in the morning.

Clary put her hair up in a ponytail before she pulled on a green tank top and jeans, not bothering to put on any makeup. It was supposed to rain, so what was the point? She then walked slowly past her sleeping mother and brother, grabbing her paints and brushes, her colored pencils and erasers and lastly- a large canvas. She did all of this silently and twenty minutes before dawn- everything was going perfect so far. As long as her brother and Jocelyn didn't wake up, she would be well on her way in thirty seconds. She stuffed her feet into her old sneakers before slowly making her way through the dreaded place that she knew as Idris.

Unlike how Idris was at night, before dawn, it was peaceful. The crime of the night was over, yet the conflict of the morning was yet to arrive. It was a quiet city in the morning; it looked just like a ghost town, so much different from how it looked at night. She shuddered thinking about how many people were shot each night in this city with a population of three fucking million people. She loved the way Idris looked without gunshots to be heard every minute, the dying screams, screams of the people who's loved ones were dying, and cries of people ringing throughout the city. But it was only dawn, and as soon as the sun rose, people would be at it again and she would no longer feel the peace that she was feeling right now.

Clary weaved in and out through the city, keeping her focus on where she was going. It was a little bit cloudy and looked like it was going to rain, and Clary started to pray that Jonathan would bring an umbrella so that she could really paint the sunrise. All of the art tools that were stuffed in her pockets as she carried the canvas was weighing her down as she slowly made her way up the hill where Jonathan was clutching an umbrella against himself as he layed down. She felt her lips curve up. He was already there. Waiting for her. Maybe he'd gotten tired or-

_Wait. _Her faint smile vanished in a split second. Clary's heart seemed to stop and she began to run, discarding the canvas and the pens and pencils as she made her way up the hill and to his side. She ran and ran and ran, not being able to breathe. _No. No no no. _She couldn't have a mental breakdown, not now. _No. _How? Why? His shoulder was gushing with blood, and she didn't know whether or not he was conscious, or hell, whether or not he was _alive. _

She dropped down to her knees and was immediately glad that she'd paid some attention in her health classes over the years as her fingers trembled and she tried to assess the wound. She felt tears fall onto his shirt as she slowly tried to peel away his shirt. It wasn't working.**(I know ur not supposed to remove the bullet when in a situation like this, but I needed this scene, so…) **She took out her pocket knife in a desperate manner and cut away the shirt that clung onto the skin around his shoulder, having to lean over and let her own shirt get soaked in his blood in the process. This couldn't be happening. Jonathan hadn't even been at the mansion. How had he been shot? Did the Circle know that he was going to go there? Did they know that he was their best asset, their best way to win?

Clary saw immediately that there was a bullet in his left shoulder. Would she have to pull it out? How would she-What would she- She started to panic, her tears falling onto Jonathan's face, her knife slipping out of her hands because it was too slippery.

Jonathan groaned and blinked before widening his eyes in surprise. "What are you doing here? Why aren't you with your mother? She ordered everybody to stay in their homes-

Clary interjected. "What happened? Why the hell are you shot? Why aren't you in a hospital? Wha-" Most importantly, how the hell was he alive?

"Sebastian." Jonathan said quietly. It didn't seem like he could speak any louder than his current volume. For the first time in forever, Jonathan Verlac sounded weak.

Clary could wait to hear what he had to say. She had to focus on keeping him alive and getting him to a hospital. "Look, we have to go to a hospital."

"No!" Jonathan cried out. "No, I can take care of it. I've done it before."

"But-

"No buts. Listen to what I say." Jonathan said quickly, taking deep breaths. Although he tried not to show it, Clary could tell that it probably hurt like hell. "Pour this on it." He motioned towards the bottle of something that he'd been holding in his hand. Clary hadn't realized what it was until now. He must've been trying to remove the bullet all on his own. "Cut it open with your knife. Take these scissors. Pull it out. Please." The please come out in a gasp.

Clary started to pale thinking about cutting open the wound even further. "Won't you bleed to death?"

"I think I'll take my chances." Jonathan mumbled. "Do it." His voice was commanding.

Clary poured whatever it was that was in the bottle onto his shoulder before cutting the spot where the bullet had gotten in a bit wider. She held the scissors, not letting her hands tremble as she stuck them into his shoulder. Jonathan gasped in pain. She couldn't comprehend how he didn't scream. It was as if he was used to it. She knew when she found it because of the light clang that it made. She grabbed it with the scissors and slowly pulled it out of his shoulder. She dropped the bullet and looked away.

Jonathan gasped in relief. "Hey. Look at me." Although they were both covered in blood and he looked terrible, he smiled at her. "Thank you." He wrapped the portion of his hoodie that Clary had cut off around his shoulder, creating a makeshift bandage, and although he seemed less tense, a hand still hovered defensively around his weakened area.

Clary resisted the urge to slap him. "I thought you were gonna die!" She yelled, crossing her arms and walking back down the hill to pick up her canvas, which had a little bit of blood on it, by the way.

"Oh, right." Jonathan got up and gestured at the sunrise. "You can paint now."

"Are you serious right now? You just got shot. You need to tell me what happened. Now." Clary put her hands to her hips and glared at him.

"Well…" Jonathan seemed to be thinking. What could he be possibly thinking about if he was just shot? It was clear- he was shot, and that was that. Would it be hard for a person to remember getting shot? Clary didn't think so. He cleared his throat. "I was heading towards the institute when I-Sebastian came and shot me in the shoulder."

That was it? Just like that? "How do you think he found out where you were going to be?" Clary's tone softened slightly.

"I'm not sure." Jonathan said. "All I know is that he shot me and left me in the middle of the street. I thought I was gonna die, so I came up here because it's-

"It's what?" Clary asked.

Jonathan took a deep breath. "It's where I last saw my mother before she told my father I was dead and burned my house down. She painted me a picture of the sunrise on a piece of notebook paper. She told me to hold onto it. But she went crazy, pushed me down the hill, and when I fell, she told me that I was a monster. She went back to V-my father and told him I was dead, ran off pregnant with a little girl and with my half-brother. I don't know what happened to her, but I lost the painting and I- I don't why a part of me wants another painting. It's stupid, I know but-"

"It's not stupid, Jonathan. It's not stupid at all. I can't believe somebody would do such a thing to you, even your own mother. Especially when you were three years old."

"My father said that she gave birth to the daughter and had a new husband for a short while and then he ki- her new husband died."

Clary put a hand to her mouth. "Why would anybody push you down the hill? Why would she paint you something? I just don't understand why anybody would do that to you. You're one of the only people I trust right now and I don't normally trust people I've just met."

"But what if I'm not the good person everybody thinks I am?" Jonathan looked at his bloody fists. "What if I am the monster? I don't deserve to have you care for me."

"Yes, you do." Clary said firmly. "You're a good person, whether you think it or not. You're not a monster. You're human, and that's perfect for me."

It started to rain around them, the raindrops whisking the blood from their skin. They were both wet from the rain, but who cared? Jonathan's lips were on Clary's and his hands were in her hair and she didn't know how to stop the wonderful sensation she felt as she let his tongue slip into her mouth. This was the only warmth that she could feel right now in a world so confusing and cold, and she wasn't going to let go.

She didn't know where it would lead or why she was kissing a boy that had just told her everything about his family and why he trusted nobody. She didn't know why he was still kissing her even though she'd thought that by now he'd let go. She didn't know anything, but it felt right.

He kissed her again. And again. And again.

Jonathan suddenly stopped. His phone rang and he mumbled into it before closing it. His face was softer than usually, without its hard edges. He looked to her, his face full of something that Clary couldn't quite assess. "I have to go. I'll see you soon, alright?"

Thirty minutes later, her phone rang. And yes, she was still on the hill.

The only words that she could decipher from her brother's panicked voice were: "_Alec's panicking. Clary please help. You're the only person who's picked up. Magnus is-" _Her phone cut off. She knew who Magnus was, and she vaguely remembered Alec from the day that Isabelle had come to her house. She remembered him talking about his fiancé. She didn't know what to do or why she felt the urge to help them.

She didn't need anybody else her family cared about to die. Not again. Especially not somebody who was one of her brother's best friends. What would happen if he lost another person right after Raphael?

She ran again.

Painting a picture would have to wait for another time.

**Did you really think I would end the chapter without something bad happening? Well you thought wrong. *evil cackle* At least I made them kiss! I hope that makes up for it. Please love me. Lol**

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**~S**


	10. We're Coming After You

**Hey. I didn't have time to edit this chapter because I was really busy this week but.. the chapter is 2000+ words long, so I hope this chapter satisfies you guys.**

***I don't own TMI***

**~S**

Magnus' chest rose and fell as Alec clenched Magnus' hand in his and stared blankly at the wall. A world where he and Magnus might not be together? Where they wouldn't- Alec let Magnus' hand fall back onto the hospital bed and let his own hands clench into tight fists at his sides.

"_Magnus! Magnus!" Alec screamed, trying to get him to run before it was too late. _Alec had seen the intruder walk into their apartment, but by the time he started yelling, it was too late.

The bullet tore through his spine, the doctors explained to him in that calm voice that they always did when they knew it was too late. Magnus had lost too much blood, they continued, he might not make it through the night.

Sebastian Morgenstern had already done enough to his family- his friends, and now his fiancé? He wanted it all to just stop.

"Alec." Jace put his hand on Alec's shoulder, reminding him that he wasn't alone. "I'm going to kill that bastard, alright?"

Alec nodded through tears. "_Aku cinta kamu,_" Magnus said all the time. It might actually have been the last I love you they'd ever share. I mean, who would be able to predict that a man would come into their apartment at dawn to shoot them?

"_Goodnight, I love you." _Alec had said, just like everyday.

"_Aku cinta kamu, my love." _Magnus cupped Alec's face in his hands.

Alec wanted to be the one to kill that bastard. He wanted to kill him over and over, to show him no mercy- Sebastian never, ever showed anybody mercy. It was like he had no soul.

"_Call Jace!" _Magnus had said back.

"_Isn't he with Clary right now?_" Alec had started to panic, fumbling his phone. If only he hadn't fumbled his phone, if only he had been holding a gun or his crossbow in his hands- Magnus wouldn't be dying.

But the oddest thing about Sebastian attacking their apartment was that Sebastian had flinched at the mention of Clary's name. Not that it had any meaning, of course. It was just… odd.

But _after _Magnus was shot and Sebastian left, that was when Alec had called Jace… who wasn't actually with Clary.

Alec cursed himself for being so helpless. He just wanted to trade places with Magnus. He wanted to take his pain away. When he saw Magnus struggle to take breaths like he was now, he wanted nothing more than to just ease his pain.

"Look, Alec. I really have to go but I'm so sorry. I…" Jace just hugged him before leaving him all alone to his own thoughts once more. Alec's nails dug into the parts of the skin where he had been clenching his fists, blood dripping down his hand.

The door opened and a certain redhead walked in. "Why are you here?" Alec's voice was more confrontational then he intended it to be, but she didn't have any business with him or with Magnus, so why was she here? Clarissa Fairchild. He felt his blood boil. Was it her fault that Sebastian had come into his house? Had he been looking for her? "I said, why the hell are you here?!"

"I just came here because my brother called me and… told me to watch over you because you might be having a rough time." Those stupid innocent green eyes were so… infuriating. He hated how she'd just look at him as if she confused as to why he didn't like her. She'd caused a shit ton of trouble for her family and the Shadowhunters, first of all. The fact that Jocelyn had to hide everything from her and make them hide it from her too was a shit ton of work too.

"Rough time? Rough time?! My fiancé just got shot! Do you think I'm in the mood to receive comfort from somebody I barely know? Who let you in here, anyways?!" Alec yelled. Why was she here? To laugh at him while he had a mental breakdown?

"No, I just wanted-

"I don't care what you and your perfect little Barbie face wanted, alright? It's because of you that Sebastian Morgenstern shot my fiancé! I don't need your comfort, I just want Magnus back-" Alec felt tears start to fall down his face.

"Don't cry…" Clary said softly, walking towards him and holding out her arms, as if that was the best she could do.

But sometimes actions meant more than words, and right now, all Alec needed was a hug and to feel like he had somebody with him. He let himself fall into her embrace and sob, his cries sounding agonizing. He didn't even know her, yet he felt himself melt into her embrace.

No wonder Magnus liked her. No wonder Jace and Jocelyn were so protective of her. She might not know everything, she was able to have a lasting impact on people- even Alec.

"Thanks. And I'm sorry for flipping out." He muttered.

"No… I get it, Alexander. People get crazy when the person they love is hurt." She mumbled.

"Call me Alec." He tried for a smile. He let himself hope that Magnus would be alright. Her green eyes seemed to get even brighter as she smiled a smile that could probably make a rainy day become sunny. "I'm sorry I yelled at you. You were only trying to help, but I couldn't think straight. Wait- I mean… gay? I mean, what?" **(A/N: haha.)**

Clary laughed softly.

"Idiot." Clary watched Alec take his fiancé's hand in his and mumble those exact words. She hadn't thought that Alec would actually end up confiding in her but he did. She felt… like she'd helped somebody. It was actually a kind of new feeling, since she was so used to being kept in the dark about everything.

Magnus' eyes flashed open, and Alec started to cough. "Oh my god."

"I could hear everything you said, Alexander. And boy was it interesting." Magnus said softly.

"You're alive." Alec said, his eyes wide with happiness. His face hardened slightly. "Idiot."

"Why am I an idiot?"

"For getting yourself shot, silly. I was so worried." Alec replied, no signs of his previous mental breakdown showing on his face at all. "But whatever. You're fine now. I love you."

"I love you too." Magnus said without hesitation, placing his palm on Alec's cheek. Alec's engagement ring, with the words _aku cinta kamu _engraved in it reflected in the light as he leaned in to kiss his fiancé.

Clary felt guilty for feeling the way she did now. When she saw the two kissing, she couldn't help but feel lonely and think about her kiss with Jon a mere hour before. Their kiss in the rain had been a moment of bliss. She couldn't help but remember Jon's hands in her hair and his lips on hers.

Then that feeling came again. The want to know what love is. Whether or not it felt like how everybody said it was. They said the word turned beautiful, and there was nothing you could frown at- how it would make her feel like she was flying. She couldn't deny it. She wanted to fall in love. She wanted her own love story.

But why was she thinking about Jon, too? She knew she had feelings for him, but she didn't… she couldn't. She didn't know how to feel that way. She didn't know how to tell if she felt that way in the first place.

She shook her head. She just watched Magnus and Alec break off their kiss and look back at her in awkward silence. "So um… when did you get shot?" She asked softly.

Magnus looked at her with those kind golden eyes of his. "About an hour ago, I think. That's what the nurses say."

"Thank god Sebastian had a shoulder wound, otherwise it would've been much harder to get him out." Alec chimed in.

"Wait. An hour ago? A shoulder wound?" _Wait.. _Clary got angry with herself for even thinking of this as a possibility. Jonathan had a shoulder wound. He left an hour and 15 minutes ago. This had to be a hilarious coincidence.

"Yeah, it was wrapped in a green fabric. It looked like he came from outside in the rain, you know? Cause he was soaked." Magnus said, vividly remembering the experience of seeing the murderer in his home.

Green fabric? Green fabric? Clary had ripped off a piece of the tank top she was wearing right now and tied it around his wound. She motioned towards her tank top, "Did it look like this?"

"Actually… it looked just like that." Alec looked at her suspiciously. "That's funny. Where did you say you were before you came here?"

"I was running. In the park." Clary said. She didn't know why she didn't just flat out say that she had been with Jonathan. Jonathan hadn't done anything wrong. He'd been shot by Sebastian, so there was no way they could be the same person. No way at all.

"But.. I have to go." Clary mumbled, suddenly feeling the urge to call Jonathan. She needed to tell him that everybody was suspicious of him. If she didn't, then they would most likely torture him, or worse. She couldn't have them do that to him. She had to prove that Jonathan wasn't Sebastian before everybody else had the chance to hurt him.

She waited until the hall of the hospital was empty before dialing Jonathan's number and calling.

"Hello?" His voice was muffled, but he was there.

"Can you come over? Please?" Clary was making herself emotional. She couldn't accept that the person she might be in love with might also be her worst nightmare. But then again… there was no way that he could be Sebastian. Sebastian was cruel and didn't have a kind bone in his body. But Jonathan had saved her that night when she was on the verge of death.

"Yeah, sure but… is Magnus alright?" Jonathan sounded concerned. That's right. Concerned. There was no way he could be Sebastian. Clary's heart was full of hope as she let herself believe that Jonathan was in no way guilty of anything.

"Yeah, he's alive and well." Clary said, her tone bright.

"Oh, that's… good." Jonathan said softly on the other end. "So do you still need me to come over?"

"Yes, it's #3 xxx Street." Clary said sweetly. **(A/N: you shouldn't have given a murder your address, Clary.)**

"Alright." Jonathan hung up.

A chill ran through Clary's body. A chill that she was ashamed of. Why had Jon sounded so disappointed when she told him that Magnus was alive?

"Clary?" Jonathan said, looking into her eyes. He'd been here for about an hour now, but they'd done nothing but talk about random things that didn't really matter. "I need to tell you something."

"Yeah?" Clary's emerald-green eyes brightened. "What is it?"

"Never mind."

"Say it, Jon."

"You know what? I'm just gonna be straight forward about this. I like you. Hell, I might love you but that's not the point. I want to be with you, but if you don't want to, I get it. I'm S- I have to go back to France eventually, but I want to take advantage of our time and-

Clary shut him up with a kiss. This time more soft and light than the several they'd had in the rain earlier that morning. "Idiot. Of course I'll date you."

"I-"

And so the night ended with a little bit more than kisses and confessions. But she was finally happy to be in Idris.

She woke up, and Jonathan was gone. Instead, Jace was shaking her furiously. "Jace? What happened? Why is my window broken?" Clary asked, panicked.

"Why don't you let me know why you let Sebastian Morgenstern into our house?" Jace demanded with more rage than she'd ever heard come out of his lips in her life.

**I love cliffhangers.**

**~S**

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**Do you want to see a flashback in time or do you want me to continue where I left off? **


	11. Nowhere to Run

**So, the response for the last chapter was mixed. I was actually planning on making it different but I ran out of time on Thursday night so I had to cut it off in a place that wasn't that satisfying. However, I'd rather keep up to date with my schedule than give myself another week to write. Anyways, this chapter is going to be a flashback where we get to finally learn the secret behind everybody's past. I hope you guys enjoy this and I'll be back for more Clabastian next week.**

**Also, Thank you to Ruth M and Horses8. **

**In this chapter, we have a whole bunch of POVS and background stories. :)**

**~S**

***I don't own TMI***

Sebastian recalled the day when his mother had thrown him off of the hill as he crept through the Fairchild residence with a knife in hand. It was only a matter of time until he found Jocelyn's room.

He'd been barely five years old when his mother had dragged him up the hill at midnight, whisking him out of bed and telling him that what they were going to do was important. Jonathan had thought that his mother was finally going to do something special for him instead of the other Jonatham for once. It had been eerily silent as she painted him a picture of the view. It was a vibrant mixture of orange, red, and yellow with some streaks of blue in it. The hill was also in the picture along with the sun, but what Jonathan noticed when he looked at the painting in his hands was that there was a little boy at the bottom of the hill in the painting, bleeding. There was a woman that looked just like his mother that had her hands out on top of the hill, as if she'd pushed the boy.

"_Mommy, who's that?" Jonathan had asked._

_Jocelyn took his hand and pointed at the dying boy. "This is you," She moved her finger to the woman on top of the hill._

"_Is she trying to help him?" Jonathan asked quietly._

"_No. She's… Jonathan?" His mother had said quietly, looking at the piece of paper in his hands. "Do you know why I hate you?"_

"_Mommy?" Jonathan had been confused, wondering why his mother had suddenly declared her hatred for him, although it had been pretty obvious that his mother hadn't taken a liking to him. "Mommy, are you sick? Is it the baby?" Yes, that's what it was, he told himself. His mother was just sick and wasn't thinking clearly. There was no way that she meant what she did in the picture. His mother wasn't like Valentine. His mother wouldn't whip him, she would just stay away. That was part of the reason why he adored her and had wanted to spend more time wit her. _

"_No, Jonathan. You're the one that's sick." Her face was full of fury. "I'm not your mommy, alright sweetheart?" She pushed him, eyes full of sorrow although fulfilled. "I'm so sorry that you were born, sweetheart. It's not your fault that all I can see when I look at you is your father." Jonathan fell, his hands still reaching out for the hug that he'd wanted so desperately from his mother, the love that he'd wanted so desperately. Jonathan felt the bones in his legs shatter as he hit the ground. _

_It hurt so bad. Not just his legs from the fall, but his heart ached because he knew that he would never be loved by his mother. It wasn't his fault that he had inherited his father's looks. He was four years old, for hell's sake. He knew that his mother hated him. But why? Why couldn't a mother love her own son? Why would his father and mother both cast their attention onto the other Jonathan while he tried so hard to please them? Why was he the one being whipped when the other Jonathan was the one that made all of the mistakes? _

_Jonathan had slowly crawled his way back home to find it burning, the other Jonathan missing but Valentine standing their with open arms. The first time that Valentine had done anything but yell and whip him. "I knew you weren't dead, my masterpiece. My perfect creation." Valentine said. It was the first time that Jonathan had ever been complimented. He found himself craving compliments from his father in the future. "That stupid woman took everything from us, Jonathan. She even took the better Jonathan from me. He took Jace and the baby. How could she leave us when pregnant? How could she take the better Jonathan?" The better Jonathan. The second child. Jace. Those were the words that Jonathan loathed the most. How was the boy that couldn't hurt a fly better than he was? How come the other Jonathan would never be punished? How come that with all of his failures, he was more loved than Jonathan would ever be?_

"_Father." Jonathan's face hardened. "Where is Jonathan and mommy?"_

"_I just said, you idiot. Your sister, brother and mother have all fled to Michael Wayland." Though Jonathan was young, he eventually understood what his father was trying to say. His mother had left everything she hated- him and his father. Part of the reason why she could never love him was because Jonathan resembled his father so much. The other Jonathan didn't, because his mother and father weren't Jocelyn and Valentine. Although Jonathan was actually the one to come from Jocelyn, Jace was more loved. What was so wrong with Jonathan that nobody could love him? What was so wrong with being obedient? If you weren't obedient, you would get whipped. That was a lesson Jonathan had learned when he was quite young. Jace had cried, and for some reason the whipping on Jace had stopped. By then, Jonathan was already used to the whipping and being obedient to his father. Although Jonathan tried so hard to get Jocelyn to love him, somehow his mother was convinced that the other Jonathan deserved to stay with her more than he did. Why would nobody love him? Why did everybody treat him like he was a monster?_

"_Sister?" Jonathan asked._

"_Step sister. That stupid bastard got Jocelyn pregnant."_

"_But why am I different? Why am I always different?"_

"_You are invincible, my son. You are special. You are my perfect creation, a perfect replica of me. If I just give you less love than even I was given, then you'll become the perfect killing machine. Together we'll get our revenge and take over this city." Valentine said cruelly with a vicious smile that one day Jonathan would be able to perfectly replicate. "We'll kill Michael and your mother."_

_From that day on, Jonathan referred to himself as Sebastian. There was no "other Sebastian" to compete against. Sebastian wasn't weak Jonathan. He was a new person. A better version of his previous self. Sebastian was invincible, and he would make his mother pay for the scars on his legs. For throwing him away, literally. He would become stronger than Jonathan, and he would make her regret her decision to try and kill him. _

_He would hurt her even more than she hurt him. When he got his hands on her? Well… that would certainly be the end of her._

Valentine had never been able to love both Jonathans. The first Jonathan was perfect. He was able to run miles and miles before getting winded, was able to withstand the pain of several whiplashes across his back at a time, and was able to throw a knife and hit the bull's eyes by the time he was four years old. He was perfection. Utter perfection. A replica of himself in a better form. The other Jonathan could barely run a lap around the field, couldn't even stand the sight of the whip, and wasn't able to hold a knife in the right direction. However- Valentine found that all of his love was directed at the second child, the failure.

Out of anger at himself for not being able to love the right child, Valentine would take it out on the first child, whipping him and sparring against him, hoping to strike some sort of emotion in himself so that he could finally let his soul be at peace with himself. The first child grew stronger and stronger, just as how Valentine had wanted, but somehow, Valentine could not love his first son. He felt absolutely connection to the son that was supposed to be his masterpiece. A child was supposed to have emotions, and this child certainly did- but he would hardly ever show it. Valentine could tell though, when Jonathan would watch Valentine play with Jace, that Jonathan wished that he could be like that. But Valentine couldn't play with Jonathan even if he tried. Jonathan was too… difficult in a way that he didn't know how to describe. He felt that his first child was like an object, as he showed no feelings and would obey no matter how difficult the task.

_Valentine remembered the first time he'd realized that he didn't love the first child. Before that, he'd just thought that there was something wrong with the child and not himself. It was only on that day that he realized that it wasn't the child, it was himself. He'd given both of the boys a bird, and told them to tame it. To make it obedient The first child had been perfectly successful, forcing it to do as he commanded. However, the second child could not help but love the bird until it loved him back._

_Valentine snapped the second boy's birds' neck out of fury with himself for feeling emotions that he shouldn't. For feeling love towards the son that had no place as the heir to their family. The boy that was an utter disgrace. "To love is to destroy," He had told Jace. "To love is to destroy." _

_The first boy disposed of the bird himself as soon as the task was over._

_Valentine felt no feelings whatsoever to his first child, although he should. Jonathan was the perfect heir, his masterpiece, a replica of himself. He tried and tried and tried to love his first child, because that was what he was supposed to do. What he was going to do before he took in Jace. Before the second child was even a possibility. If Jace hadn't existed, would it be possible for Valentine to love his first child?_

_However- his wife had tried much harder than him, at least at first. Although the second boy was from two other parents- Stephen Herondale and Celine Herondale, who were very much dead, Valentine found that he couldn't tell the second child who his real parents were, and Jocelyn found herself in love with the little Herondale boy. To her, this Jonathan felt like the son that she really wanted. Jocelyn hated Valentine. Jocelyn hated everything about him. When she saw how similar Jonathan was to Valentine, she stopped trying to love the boy she could never love._

_Jocelyn would instead focus her utter attention on the second child, ignoring her real child, who she saw as a monster because of the similarities she saw between him and Valentine, not just the looks but even certain mannerisms. That terrified her, the fact that she had given birth to a mini Valentine. Eventually, Jocelyn even gave the second boy a nickname- Jace. JC. That way she wouldn't have to look at the boy she adored and call him Jonathan, a name associated with a monster that she couldn't bare to admit that she had given birth to. _

_Then one day, Jocelyn couldn't take it anymore. It was a five months after she had found out that she was pregnant again. With a little girl. She had convinced Valentine that it was his. He learned later that she'd flung Jonathan off of a cliff while Valentine was asleep, taken Jace and run to Michael Wayland- her boyfriend, and… the father of the little girl that he'd thought was his. His heart shattered into a million pieces. He'd loved her, he really had. He'd wanted to try and make it work out. To try and raise their children happily._

_Until he realized that everything Jocelyn had ever said to him had been a facade._

_Jonathan had come back after being pushed, bloody, bruised, and broken, back to his father. Valentine had put him through enough years of torture that Jonathan could come back to him, even after being thrown off of a cliff. That's when Valentine realized that although he was not capable of loving Jonathan, Jonathan was a masterpiece. His masterpiece. His creation. An invincible boy. Valentine's own killing machine. "Come here, Jonathan." He'd embraced his sobbing boy into his arms, realizing how much of a success that Jonathan was. Although Valentine could not love his boy as a person, he could love him as he had made him to be. His killing machine._

Sebastian was the name Jonathan referred to himself as now. Sebastian was a perfect assassin, doing anything to please his father out of the need to not be thrown away by his father the same way his mother had. That was just perfect for Valentine, because he had his own personal assassin, bodyguard, whatever you could think of.

Now, Sebastian was finishing up the job that they'd started long ago- he was going to kill his mother. Valentine was finally able to feel something for his son- a sense of accomplishment that you'd get after finishing a long assignment at school, as if it was worth it to turn his wife and adoptive son against him for the sake of having this killing machine.

He would finally be able to annihilate everybody that had wronged him, starting with Jocelyn.

As for Jace, killing Michael Wayland had changed him for the better, in Valentine's opinion. If only Jace had come back to Valentine, then Valentine would have two perfect killing machines good enough to rival each other. Jace was now only second to Sebastian. Jace had considered Michael Wayland his father, and killing him had ruined him. Jace was able to kill, and in fact had killed more members of the Circle than anybody before him. Valentine had faith that Sebastian would kill Jace in an especially cruel way. If Jace didn't love Valentine, then he would be better off dead. Valentine was still not over the fact that he did love Jace, even though he'd tormented him beyond reason.

Jocelyn's gang of _noble _people were called shadowhunters, and that was who Valentine was going to annihilate. They were in no way noble. They were started by a woman who tried to kill her son.

Valentine smiled a real smile for the first time in years, absorbing the new feeling of victory he felt, absorbing the fact that he could practically rule over Idris. He was finally the one that had control.

Jocelyn had her mouth open ready to scream when she saw a flash of black eyes that she'd never thought about seeing again appeared out of nowhere. His hands went straight to her mouth; he knew that she was going to try to scream for help. "Hello mother. Let's not scream, shall we?" Sebastian smiled cruelly, his black eyes looking right into her soul. "I have bombs in your beloved son's room. His name is Jace, right? What a shame… if I wasn't killing you right now, I'd be able to kill that idiot before he wakes up." Jocelyn forced herself not to scream as she saw flashes of Valentine in Sebastian. She couldn't let Jace die the way Michael had, not ever. _Clary… _Jocelyn thought.

"But first, I'm going to hurt you. I'm going to put you through everything that you did to me. Everything from the whipping to the carving of my skin. Then, I'm going to throw you off of that hill, just like you did to me." Sebastian gestured at the scars all over his arms, no way to conceal them.

Jocelyn paled. "You're a monster."

Sebastian turned red with anger. "I was never anything but obedient to you! You couldn't even love your own son, your flesh and blood? What did you love instead? Another man's child?!"

"He's more of a son to me then you ever were."

"What do you mean?" Sebastian demanded.

"I'm not your mother! You're… different. All I see in you is Valentine, and I can't see anything else. Jace… He was _human! _All you ever did was everything that I asked you to!" Jocelyn fought back, struggling against Sebastian's strong grip against her arms.

Sebastian's mouth gaped for a second before his face got even more angry. "But you loved Jace even though he came from different parents. How's that different from me? Why couldn't you love your own son? Why couldn't you even _try?_ What's so wrong with me that you had to either avoid me like the plague or curse me and hit me like I was a burden to you? How is being like Valentine something to make you hate me enough to throw me off of a cliff when I was five?!" Sebastian cried out. "I have feelings, Jocelyn! I'm not a monster, I just didn't know how to make somebody who stared at me like I was some sort of… creature happy! I was _five, _Jocelyn. What makes you think that just because I looked like my father that I could be abused by the only mother I ever had in my life? What else was a five year old supposed to do? Why did you expect so much of me? Why didn't-why couldn't you love me? Why couldn't you just love a boy that you had to take care of?"

"Because I can't stand you!" Jocelyn's face hardened. "All you ever did was obey your father. You barely had a personality! I couldn't see anything positive about you."

"Look closer." Sebastian locked eyes with her.

They were soulless and full of the sorrow and trauma that He laughed. "So… you never had a real reason to hate me? You just did because I tied you to Valentine, and Jace didn't? Huh." He pulled out his knife and sunk it into her arm. "I guess Valentine was right. Some people are just heartless. You couldn't love me even if you tried, because you didn't love Valentine? Although I may be genetically enhanced or whatever, you still gave birth to me. I'm like this because of you. Because of both of you. Because nobody would love me. Nobody. Not until-" He cut himself off and glared at her.

"Next time you try to kill somebody, I recommend you don't throw them off of a hill. It's quite ineffective." Sebastian said. "And I lied about the bombs, by the way. I don't need them. I can just kill Jace the old fashioned way."

"I-

"I'll make sure you die when you're thrown off the cliff." Sebastian said, his hands covered in blood. "I'll make sure you feel pain when you do. I know you'll go to hell, which is right where you belong. Now if you excuse me, I need to kill my brother." He left her alone and bleeding on her mattress, covered in tears.

"No Jace, I don't understand. I didn't let a murderer into our house. I wouldn't let somebody that tried to kill you into our house." Clary said.

"Oh my god, Clary. Are you that dumb? FUCKING JONATHAN IS SEBASTIAN!" Jace screamed at her.

Clary paled as Sebastian emerged from behind them, hands bloody. Had he just killed her mother? Clary stared in horror at Jonathan- no, Sebastian. How could the boy that had held her in his arms and comforted her when she was questioning everything about herself be the person that killed her father? A person that's goal was to kill her mother? "Is it true? Jon… is that you?" Her eyes widened in disbelief. No- it wasn't the fact that she couldn't believe it… it was because she didn't want to believe it. She couldn't believe that the boy who'd saved her from dying could be the man that had killed her father. She couldn't believe that he'd be capable of something like that. He couldn't. He just wasn)t like that. "Jon, how could you? Are you really…" She started to whisper. "...Sebastian Morgenstern?"

"Yes, but I-" He started to reach out towards her.

"Get away from me!" Clary screamed, backing away.

He grabbed her arm. "Clary, I can explain-"

"Don't touch me!" Clary said as she saw a hurt look flash in front of Sebastian's eyes before his face hardened. "Explain what? You lead me on just to find out where I live, right? So that you could kill my mother and Jace. You kissed me and slept with me and I-" She looked away. "I thought I loved you."

"Clary, please." Sebastian pleaded. "Please trust me."

"I don't know if I can."

**Cliffhangers. I love cliffhangers. What did you think, now that all of the secrets are out? I have 2(ish) more chapters left to write. I have to start thinking about new fic ideas… do you have any?**

**~S**

**Leave a suggestion in the reviews! Favorite and follow please.**


	12. This is the Hunt

**Hello again. School's been quite busy so my thoughts are everywhere and I'm not sure the last chapter made sense but here I am. I've still tried to private message people who've reviewed this week. :)**

**This is the last chapter… wow. I can't believe it because I feel like this isn't even the best I can write, and I just can't believe the amount of people that actually like this. But anyway, I'll make sure that this is the best chapter I've ever written.**

**But this chapter is the very last, so I'm kinda sad but excited for the new fic. I know that my writing can be confusing, but I hope you enjoy it regardless.**

**Update: I changed my username to IShipClabastian6 ! I think it works better.**

**~S**

**Last week: "Clary, please." Sebastian pleaded. "Please trust me."**

"**I don't know if I can." **

"I want to trust you, Sebastian." Clary's eyes were bright green, tears making them glow, staring into Sebastian's soul. "Please just tell me how. I want to trust you so badly… I just don't have a reason to."

After going to Jocelyn's room in the middle of the night while Clary was unaware, after trying to kill Jocelyn but not being able to and leaving her in her room and telling her to leave the country, after the years of torture with a brother that was considered better than him for no reason at all… now he was losing the trust of the only person left in the world that had faith in him.

"Clary." Sebastian took her hand to the shock of Jace, who seemed to be frozen as soon as he saw it. He ignored the fear that she would go running back to her mother and would consider him evil just like the rest of the world. Sebastian Morgenstern was evil, but what about Jonathan Christopher? Johnathan Christopher, the little boy who'd been thrown off a cliff by his mother? Sebastian couldn't help his memories from flooding through his mind, to painful to keep hidden inside the deep depths where everything that hurt was kept. There was too much pain to keep inside. He couldn't lose Clary.

He went with the most simple thing that he could think of. The truth. "You don't need a reason. Just trust in the person you want to trust."

Jace seemed to snap out of it. "How did trusting this bastard help you in any sort of scenario, Clary? His father killed yours, and Sebastian probably just killed our mother."

"But Jace." Sebastian said quietly. "Jocelyn Fairchild is not your mother."

"What do you mean?"

"Don't you remember growing up with me as a child? Did you really think that you were the biological son of a mass murderer when you couldn't even hold a knife the right way? Valentine is not your biological son, although he definitely used to prefer you over me. Oh, did he tell you that I was the adopted one?" Sebastian said in an unsurprised tone.

"But you are adopted." Jace said defensively. "Why else would they whip you and not me? Why else would they keep away the brother that I used to want to play with?"

"I don't know." Sebastian's tone was cold as Clary watched the two argue. "Somehow, they preferred you over their actual biological son."

"But… who are my real parents? Is it Michael Wayland?"

"Your parents were the Herondales. They used to be father's servants. My father killed them and took you as his own. We're nothing to Valentine, as much as you'd like to believe that father still gives a shit about you. He gave up on you and Jocelyn as soon as you left us."

Jace's mouth was wide open in an O. "... Valentine isn't my father? Jocelyn isn't my mother? Does that mean that Clary isn't directly related to either of us?" Jace glared at Sebastian. "Our parents told me that you were a crazy, schizophrenic boy that we had to take in because it was in your parents' will. I was so excited when I finally got to meet you that one day, and you just ignored me. They told me that it would be better to leave you alone."

"None of that is true. I'm not schizophrenic." Sebastian said, anger rising up in his system. "Aren't you sick of lies being thrown at your face? Aren't you sick of everybody telling you things only to find out that they're only part true or not true at all? Jace, Jonathan Christopher, my enemy, my brother, my twin soul- don't you see? We're all living in a lie crafted by our parents. What did Jocelyn say to you when you guys left?"

"Mom told me that you died in a fire with dad. Only a couple years later, Valentine came and killed Michael Wayland before Clary was old enough to remember." He took in a deep breath. "Of course I'm tired of living like this. Don't you know how many times I tried to convince you to stop and come with me?"

Sebastian tried to say something but no words came out.

"I really did think of you as my brother, Sebastian. I'm sorry I didn't try harder to help you, no… to save you when our parents hurt you. I know this is unforgivable."

"Why are you asking me for forgiveness?" Sebastian asked in disbelief. "I treated you like shit."

"Because that's what our parents taught you. You weren't all that bad. I just… I used to think that being around you would make our parents do the same thing to me. I lived a sheltered and loving life for so long that I didn't want to risk losing it all. But if I had just helped you one day…"

"That wouldn't have changed the fact that Jocelyn and Valentine hated me. They hated me because I was obedient. Because I wanted them to love me."

"Look, Sebastian. You're a murderer but so am I. There's nobody good or bad here. We should stop living the way our parents are making us."

This message hit Clary too. She was really living a lie. She was living the way her mother wanted her to. How could she side with the person that had lied to her for sixteen years about who she really was and lie to her that her father was just a man she met at a bar one night? Why would her mother change her name and pretend that a son that she didn't even have the rights to was hers? Why would she do all of those things? How would it be possible to say that it was all in the name of love when she'd dropped her own son off of a cliff when he was only five? She couldn't side with Valentine, either. She couldn't side with her mother or Valentine. She could only side with herself and what her heart would choose. Because in truth there was no right and there was no wrong. There would only be choices that she would either regret or look back on as the one that would make her the most fulfilled.

And this was the choice she had to make.

She let Sebastian pull her into his arms as they both tuned everything else out. Sure, he was a murderer. But so was her mother. Her father. Valentine. Jace. Everybody had hurt everyone. There was no side that was not guilty. Except maybe Valentine, but that was beside the point. So she would follow her heart and trust that it would guide her on the path that she would not regret.

Jace looked up from his staring session with the floor and held his hand out to Sebastian after he let her go. This seemed to be the first time they'd ever cooperated. "Brothers?" Sebastian questioned softly in disbelief. Jace had spent years hating Sebastian and was suddenly offering his hand. Sebastian was willing to take it after years of loathing him for something he didn't do wrong.

Jace's steely features softened, and so did Sebastian's. In a way, since they'd both been raised by the same man, they were brothers. They were brothers the way that Clary and Jace were siblings. Through the many experiences that they'd had along the way. "Brothers," Came Jace's reply. He sounded shocked with himself, but as soon as he let his walls crack, the whole thing came down.

Clary saw a tear fall from Sebastian's eye. "All these years I hated you for something that wasn't even your fault. But now I'm realizing that had I been kind to you, then maybe I wouldn't be the way that I am now. I might still have been hurt by our parents, but I would've had a brother."

"All I ever wanted was a brother. Not an enemy." Jace said quietly, his voice cracking from the memories of everything in the past mixing together, and the shattered pieces of his heart finally pulling themselves back together. "All I wanted was somebody to teach me how to do all the things that you did, so that we could bear the pain together."

Sebastian's eyes widened in realization of everything he'd done. "... and all I did was push you away. For what our parents did to us. Nothing was ever your fault.. I just chose to hate you because it was easier." He made direct eye contact with Jace and finally said the words his heart had been wanting to shout for all of these years of hatred. "I'm so sorry."

"I'm sorry too. If I had made the effort to try and talk to you again after all of these years-" Jace held back. All of the things he'd seen Sebastian do didn't exactly matter anymore. Jace had hurt people the same way Sebastian had. They'd both hurt people. They'd both done unforgivable things. They were both unforgivable.

Which was exactly why they chose to forgive now after all of this time.

Jace broke out into quiet laughter. "You didn't kill Jocelyn, did you?"  
"Actually… I didn't. I thought I would." Sebastian said softly. "I thought that after everything she's done to me, I would be able to just… you know, end it all. But when I held the knife to her throat, and the way she looked at me… it was pure hatred. Somehow, I expected her to show me sympathy. Or tell me that's she's sorry. All she told me was that she wished she'd never given birth to me. I thought that if I tortured her, if I killed her, I would be satisfied. I thought that killing her would make me feel whole. But seeing her again after such a long time made me remember all of those years I wished for her to love me, and realized that she wouldn't be able to. So I just… left her there." He turned to look at Clary. "You make me feel whole, Clary. You fill the empty gap that's been in my heart for all of these years. And if you don't hate me after I deceived you, after I hunted you down to find Jocelyn, for killing Raphael… I want- I…" He went silent.

"I thought I would hate you, Sebastian. I really did. But the way you spoke to me, the way you looked at me, there's no way that all of that could really be a lie. I know what you've done, Sebastian. And I love you. I didn't fall in love with the heartless Sebastian; I fell for the Sebastian I know. I fell for the person who feels things. For the person who's trying to tell me that he legitimately cares about me. The reason that I didn't think I could trust you… the reason that I wouldn't trust you… it would be if everything you did was a lie." She smiled softly at him, her emerald colored eyes shining bright. "But it isn't."

Sebastian took a deep breath, his cold features softening and his the corner of his lips that were always hard were kind. "Thank you, Clary." He cupped her face with his hands and brought her face close to his so they were almost kissing. "Thank you for teaching me how to live. Thank you for showing me how to love somebody. Thank you for making me finally feel whole again."

Jace also looked finally… fulfilled. It was like tons and tons of weight had been taken off of his shoulders after being the thing that kept him from being happy for so long had finally been lifted, and he smiled. He smiled a real, genuine smile. He'd finally gotten the family he'd longed for all these years.

But did happy things ever come without a price to pay?

The sound of a gunshot rang through the house. "Father." Sebastian said, and the kind look on his face vanished in an instance, and Sebastian Morgenstern was back. "I have to pretend. I have to pretend to hate you again. So you'll live." He shoved them both away. "Run. Run so I never have to hurt either of you again." A brief look of panic and fear struck upon his face before another gunshot rang and all of his emotions disappeared again. His tone was quick, rushed, fast. "Go. Please."

"Sebastian." Clary said quietly. "What are you talking about? What do you mean-

"Go before Valentine comes and you're really dead! Go and finally live normally! Go before he makes me kill you!" His voice radiated fear as he began to pull away from them both, hands raised as if he was a villain and as if he thought they would be scared of him. "Please, Clary! Jace, our promise? We're brothers, and I'm doing this to protect you! Twenty more seconds before he ruins everything! Run out the door and never come back!"

"You can come with us. Please, Sebastian-

The door opened with a loud bang and Sebastian wheeled around. "I'm so sorry," He said quickly, hiding away his emotions and turning into the emotionless robot everybody conceived him to be. Valentine was already here, and because nobody had listened to Sebastian, Clary and Jace would pay the price. Sebastian pulled a long knife out and held Clary so that the knife touched her neck. He also had Jace pinned down on the ground with his foot, so he would be unable to get up. "Father. I have them." Sebastian's empty voice robotically said. "Should I dispose of them?" For a moment, Clary was afraid. Afraid that what he had just said was a lie.

But she had to have faith in him. Faith that he wasn't lying and that he really did care and that he'd really tried to save them.

"As expected of my best son." Valentine walked to Clary and took one of her strands of hair into his hands. Clary noticed the body he was dragging along with him- her mother. "Looks just like her mother." His voice was full of disgust. "My failure of a son." He nodded at Jace. "At least he can fight now."

The Sebastian Clary saw now was a lie, but it looked… so real. The way Sebastian had the knife pressed against her without mercy, without giving her a chance to run- it was terrifying. Clary remembered the words Sebastian had said to her. If only she'd run… she might've been able to figure out how to get Sebastian afterwards. She was stupid, so stupid. Sebastian was probably breaking inside. "Shall I kill her?" Sebastian said, the knife starting to cut into her skin a bit. Sebastian's hands didn't tremble, although Clary could see that he was making an effort not to. Clary's heart was breaking too. Sebastian had gone from promising to love her and how she made him whole to asking Valentine if he should kill her.

"Jocelyn isn't quite dead yet, and I'd like to finish her off." Valentine said as he shot her limp body. "You left her in that room. Did you get distracted by your brother? Actually, I think Jocelyn may have died when I dragged her here. Oops." He laughed maniacally.

Clary was glad that he wasn't really her father. But seeing her mother dead… she almost burst into tears. Almost. Instead, rage filled her until she exploded. "You monster." She spat. "Don't you see that you're hurting Sebastian?"

"Hurting him?" Valentine laughed. "This boy doesn't have feelings, dear. That's why I keep him around. He doesn't even complain when I whip him."

Rage made Clary go red. "Why do you have to make our lives so miserable?! Why have you tried so hard to break us apart? Why do you insist that Sebastian had no feelings when he's more human than you'll ever be?!"

"Sebastian, my boy. Kill her. I'm sick of her nonsense." Clary felt Sebastian tense ever so slightly. It was just enough for Jace to get up and take the knife from Sebastian and swing a fist at Valentine. Sebastian might've been able to get Jace back, back he chose not to act. Clary could feel Sebastian's relieved sigh against her. Jace gave Sebastian an almost unnoticeable nod and threw the knife on the ground where Sebastian could reach.

Clary had hope that they knew what they were doing. She had hope that they would somehow manage to get out.

Although there had been a brief moment where Sebastian had hesitated, just as Valentine got up, Sebastian had Clary pinned against the wall. "Should I snap her neck?"

"NO!" Jace shouted, not noticing the gun that Valentine had begun to raise. Clary opened her mouth to warn him, but before she could, she was interrupted. Just as Sebastian let go of Clary and threw the knife that Jace had dropped onto the floor in front of him right into Valentine's head, the gunshot rang. Jace had known that Sebastian would kill Valentine. What Jace didn't know was that Valentine still had his gun. Valentine and Jace both fell to the floor in unison.

"Traitor!" Valentine yelled. "You son of a-

Sebastian stepped on his head with all of his strength, crushing it. There were spikes that came out of his boots when he hit something hard enough. "Yes, father. You're a bitch." Tears were falling from his eyes as he raced to Jace, whose every breath was labored. The brother he'd finally rekindled a relationship with was dying, and there was nothing that he could do. "It should've been me." Was the first thing that sprang from his mouth as he took Jace's hand. Clary too was at her brother's side, holding his other hand in hers, tears dripping down her cheek.

"IT SHOULD'VE BEEN ME!" Sebastian screamed, the pain and agony from all of his sins crashing back down onto him. "I deserve it. I've done nothing but hurt people, and you just… you forgave me. You deserve to live. You deserve-

"Sebastian." Jace's eyes were bright and alive, though not for much longer. He winced. "You don't deserve to die. I'm not gonna say that I do. This wasn't supposed to happen. If anything, it's just accidental."

Sebastian's body racked with sobs and screams that he'd never let out before. There was no way his brother would survive this. "We were supposed to kill Valentine and then finally run free. We were going to- you forgave me, Jace. After everything I did to you."

"No, Sebastian. You forgave me. That's all I ever wanted, Sebastian. I got what I wanted. You forgave me. I won't die hated by you." He smiled. "I feel so happy. Everything I've hated about my life… it's gone. I'm free now, Sebastian? Don't you see?" Over these past years, he always knew he might die during a mission. But this was different. He had his brother. He had his sister. He had the two people he loved most in the world together with him. He was finally free of Valentine and Jocelyn. Free of his sins… because the person that hated him more than anybody had forgiven him. He took one last, deep breath, knowing it was his last, still smiling. "I'm happy."

Those were the last two words he said, letting it ring through the room clearly and effortlessly so that Sebastian would hear and know it was true. Jace was finally happy. He was finally free. Sebastian screamed and cried, his body shaking as he held his brother in his arms and begged for him to come back before he turned to the side and clung onto Clary. They both wept not only for each other but for the happy ending they'd both lost and received. They cried into each others' arms and didn't let go.

"I'm sorry for scaring you. If you hate me… " Sebastian said. "I would never forgive myself." He started to tremble, the weight of everything he'd done hitting him.

But Clary was with him to support those weights.

"I could never." Clary said, the loss of Jace hanging over them but not as bad as it would be if they alone.

The love they had was all around them and they held each other and stayed that way for a very long time, giving each other all of the comfort they deserved.

**The end. Wow. Just.. wow. I can't believe it's over. I can't believe I killed Jace. You know, in my original draft for this chapter, Sebastian ended up betraying them and Clary joined Valentine? *coughs* I'm so much happier with this outcome and I hope you are too. I know it was really confusing and convoluted and there are plot holes. But… even so, I hope you liked reading it. 3,000+ views? Thank you. **

**I'm going to get cheesy now so you don't have to read.**

**I want to thank everybody. So here's everyone that followed this as a thank you. I really do notice you and every review does brighten my day and makes me smile. Seeing an email with the words "followed" makes me so happy. But if you don't want to be on here, please pm me and I'll remove your name:**

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**Again, if you don't want your name here please private message me.**

**I just want to thank certain people on here. **

**Ruth M- Oh you're an OG. You've been here since my 500 word long chapters and my long breaks in between chapters. Thank you so so much.**

**Lullaby baby rock a by bye- although I'm not sure if you'll see this, thanks for replying to my pms even though you're going through such a hard time.**

**Horses8- thanks for giving me ideas and sticking with me through… how many fanfics? I have no idea. But thank you so much for everything. I'm happy to call you a friend.**

**I honestly didn't think this fanfic would do well but it really did. I appreciate it. Now please take a sneak peak of my new fic. It's going to be called The Fairchild Legacy and is set in the Victorian time period and is an AU where Clary is being betrothed to Jace Herondale but is secretly in a relationship with Sebastian Morgenstern. I'm not sure whether it'll be a love triangle or just plain Clabastian though. Give me your thoughts. But anyway here's the sneak peak:**

"**We can't." Clary sighed. "If it were a couple of months ago, back when everything was going great, then maybe, but… Sebastian, your father was a blacksmith. My father is a baker hoping that with his daughter's looks he can get a nobleman's son to propose… and it happened. I'm sorry, Sebastian. You know that with the measles outbreak in town and mother catching it, nobody comes to the bakery anymore." She looked up at him, not realizing the tears streaming down her eyes. "I wish that my father would've said yes to you." **

**Sebastian wiped her tears away gently, his hands calloused from the hours spent helping his father make tools, his clothes dirty and his hair messy. "You could've rejected it."**

"**You know that I can't, Sebastian. We're about to lose the house. The bakery. Everything. We'd be as poor as a blacksmith's family." Clary's eyes widened, about to take back the statement she'd just made. "Wait, I meant-**

"**I know very well what you mean, Clary." Sebastian's eyes were sad, and looking into them was like looking into a sea of sorrow. "I'm sorry I wasn't born something else.**

"**No, I should've said something else." Clary said. "But you know I said yes. I would leave my family for this… if Jonathan hadn't offered to marry me. If I had another sibling who'd be willing to get married." She shook her head. "It would be too cruel of me to just leave."**

**I'll see you again on here to let you know when the first chapter is up next Friday.**

**~S **


	13. New Story

My new Victorian AU Clabastian fanfic is now up, and I would love it if you would check it out!

s/13417866/1/The-Fairchild-Legacy

Here's the summary: Clary Fairchild is the daughter of the baker in town. However, her mother is sick and therefore the townsfolk are avoiding her family like the plague and they can't get any business. Her father sets her up for a marriage to a wealthy nobleman named Herondale and Clary is forced into an engagement although she is already in love with the Blacksmith's son, Sebastian.

I really recommend it if you enjoy Victorian AUs or just plain old Clabastian... or maybe if you like my writing style haha. Anyways thank you for reading This is the Hunt, I love you all.


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